Volume 5 – A Distance Within Reach, Chapter 65: Long-Distance Raid
At about the same time, Qianye naturally comprehended the secrets and basic techniques of Nirvanic Rend. The darkness origin power on the book then completely disappeared, and the sword-wielding human figure also faded away gradually.
The Book of Darkness flipped back to the content page on its own, and the only words upon it, “tempering”, also grew indistinct. Qianye tried flipping the page again, but he couldn’t no matter how he tried.
He was thinking about sword techniques when he activated that function just now. As such, the Book of Darkness took all of the basic sword techniques he knew, weeded out the complicated parts, kept the simple essence, and then integrated them into his weapon of choice, the East Peak. In the end, everything culminated into a single move: Nirvanic Rend.
The process of tempering martial arts consumed the darkness origin power within the Book of Darkness which, in turn, came from essence blood. The consumption involved in this process was truly astonishing. Qianye did some calculations and found that the required essence blood was equivalent to that of two third-rank viscounts.
Had the quantity been even slightly insufficient, the tempering process might’ve stopped at the first few sword moves and the final Nirvanic Rend wouldn’t have appeared.
This discovery came as a pleasant surprise for Qianye. Andruil’s True Sight, the Wings of Inception, and the Book of Darkness could all be considered amazing items.
But despite their colossal might, the Wings of Inception and Book of Darkness were also amazing in their blood essence requirement. Two third-rank viscounts were only enough to feed a single page on the Book of Darkness. It was obvious that he would need similar amounts of essence blood if he wanted to use the tempering ability again. And this was just a single sword stance—the essence blood requirement would be even greater if he needed to temper higher level martial techniques.
Tempering was only the first page of the Book of Darkness. It didn’t take a lot of thinking to know that he would need to fork out vast amounts of essence blood if he wanted to see more pages.
Comparatively, the Wings of Inception was even more hateful—the dark golden blood energy had already devoured so much blood essence blood and yet, even up to this day, only half of a single feather had been lit. It was unknown just how many experts would have died in Qianye’s hands by the time both wings were illuminated.
Qianye couldn’t help but laugh wryly. With two big abyss-like consumers in the form of the Wings of Inception and the Book of Darkness, the growth of his three blood energies fell by more than half. All in all, this could be considered a blessed distress—it seemed he would have to join more battles in the future.
He picked up East Peak and walked out of the camp. He brought out his motorcycle in a secluded area and drove toward the wilderness, hoping to find a place to test out the might of his Nirvanic Rend.
There was an isolated valley to the northwest of Dark Flame’s garrison with a steep cliff dozens of meters tall at its entrance. The stony surface was bright, clean, and fairly suitable to test out a martial technique. This place was already quite a distance from the camp and likely wouldn’t alarm others even if he stirred up a commotion.
Qianye drew the blade and circulated his origin power in silence. Then, with a loud cry amidst wind and thunder, East Peak unleashed a Nirvanic Rend toward the opposite precipice.
A wisp of darkness origin power emerged from the void as East Peak slashed out and flowed into the blade’s edge, merging with Qianye’s origin power. The sword was suffused by hazy black mist as a faintly discernible sword light burst forth, extending ten meters and cutting apart the rocky cliff in its entirety.
A crack appeared at the center of the smooth stone cliff amidst the loud rumble which then shot explosively in every direction like a spider web. Shattered rocks fell like rain as a ten-meter long and two-meter deep sword scar appeared before Qianye in the blink of an eye.
The might of this blow shocked Qianye even though he was already expecting it.
He carefully recalled the process by which he unleashed the Nirvanic Rend and how he had caught the strand of darkness origin power through the void. Perhaps this was the key to this overperforming might. Qianye could also utilize origin power while attacking, but that power was from his surroundings and not drawn out from the void.
Obtaining the Nirvanic Rend made up for Qianye’s biggest shortcoming—his lack of a powerful combat art. The only weak point was that both the Wings of Inception in Nirvanic Rend consumed large amounts of energy, and his ability to continue fighting would plummet after a single use.
Qianye felt that he could, at most, swing three Nirvanic Rends in his peak state. He picked up East Peak and reached out to touch the stone cliff that was no longer smooth. He then left the valley in the end after confirming the might of his sword technique.
The motorcycle had just entered the main gates when Zhao Yuying appeared out of nowhere. This beautiful lady was, at the moment, looking fairly miserable—her face was covered in so much dirt that it was almost difficult to make out her original countenance. The combat attire on her body was also full of cuts and holes, not much better than the junkyards residents of Evernight Continent.
Upon finding Qianye, Zhao Yuying jumped onto his motorcycle without a word and squeezed Qianye to the back seat. “Follow me!”
“What’s the matter?” Qianye was somewhat startled.
“An extremely important matter. I think I’ve figured out the old spider’s secret!”
From the sudden appearance of those vampires and the origin array that hadn’t been cracked up to this day, Qianye knew that Count Stuka was plotting something. Perhaps because the dark races enjoyed long lifespans, it seemed they were always scheming in order to relieve their boredom and prevent themselves from becoming a pool of stagnant water.
Additionally, their schemes were more often related to their internal conflicts rather than their conflicts with humans. That was why Qianye had paid little attention to the arachne count’s secret in the beginning.
But it was apparent from Zhao Yuying’s expression that the matter wasn’t as he had thought. Stuka’s conspiracy might somehow be related to the human race—either that or it involved massive profits. Otherwise, this young miss who, more often than not, possessed a unique way of thinking, wouldn’t be so anxious.
“What’s Stuka up to?” Qianye asked.
Zhao Yuying didn’t reply. She opened up the lid at the top end of the motorcycle and revealed a row of hidden switches. Qianye was startled because she had never told him about them.
Zhao Yuying pushed all of the switches upward—the vehicle began to jolt restlessly, and the sound of the engine became muffled and powerful.
“Hang on tight!” she shouted as the motorcycle leapt out amidst a loud rumble. Its wheels spun at high speed and shaved two deep traces on the ground.
The vehicle shot out thunderously like a fired cannon shell, almost flinging Qianye off. He subconsciously tightened his hug around Zhao Yuying’s waist as the motorcycle accelerated to extreme speeds and the scenery around them became fairly blurry.
Zhao Yuying didn’t even have the patience to make a turn out of the camp gates and simply charged straight at the fence.
Qianye cried out, “Where are you going?” But his voice was drowned out by the roar of running machinery and friction.
The noise of the engine escalated even higher as Zhao Yuying grabbed the handles and swerved ever so slightly. The motorcycle charged up an inconspicuous little mound at the speed of wind and lightning—its wheels rose several meters into the air and flew right over the protective fence. The vehicle then drew a parabola in the air before landing heavily on the ground.
The motorcycle was unexpectedly able to withstand such a rough landing as though it were nothing and then proceeded to roll into the distance amidst thunderous rumbles.
Only in Zhao Yuying’s hands was this motorcycle able to draw out the true meaning behind the word “wild”. Comparatively, Qianye’s own method was like riding a docile little sheep.
“Where are we going to?” Qianye moved close to Zhao Yuying’s ears and shouted loudly. This willful young miss was always so swift and decisive. They should’ve made proper plans after finding some clues—it was simply too rash to charge out like this without even informing Dark Flame.
“To a certain mining pit!” Zhao Yuying shouted back.
They couldn’t hear each other amidst the thunderous roar of the engine without shouting at the top of their lungs.
Zhao Yuying shouted once more as if she knew Qianye would surely blame her actions. “It’s fine to leave those burdens behind!”
Qianye was rendered speechless. But then he recalled a different matter. “Didn’t you mobilize some men to attack a settlement?”
“Ah! I forgot!” Zhao Yuying replied as though it was all right and proper.
“Then what about the company you took along?!”
“They should be fighting already, I guess.” A response typical of the granddaughter of Duke You.
Qianye roared furiously, “You let them attack a settlement on their own?”
“So what?! It’s just a settlement. This mommy here can overturn a dozen or so of them in one night. They’re an entire company! What’s the use if they can’t even handle that?”
“You!”
Considering the scale of dark race settlements in this region, a single company of Dark Flame soldiers was enough under normal circumstances. The problem was that they were already deep in enemy territory and no longer in the buffer zone. It would be terrible if there was a traveling dark race expert in the settlement.
If by any chance the expert was at the level of Qianye or Zhao Yuying, even an entire battalion would fail to return, to speak nothing of a single company.
Zhao Yuying suddenly accelerated once more whereupon the engine let out a deafening roar and it became difficult to converse even with shouts. Qianye could only clam up—he seemed to vaguely catch Zhao Yuying’s last few words about how a unit incapable of fighting independently was useless, and those without sufficient luck were also useless.
The motorcycle shattered the peaceful night and shook all life-forms within several kilometers out of their dreams, throwing the wilderness into a commotion. Countless birds and beasts gazed in terror as the faraway metal beast shot through wilds at unimaginable speeds and drove into the distance.
They only dared return to their nests after the rumble of the motorcycle receded. But it would likely take them quite some time to fall back asleep.
On the way, Qianye finally couldn’t resist the urge and shouted once more, “Aren’t you announcing our location to the dark races with this ruckus?”
“So what if they know? Who will dare come and throw away their lives, that old spider?
Qianye turned silent once again. It was just as Zhao Yuying said—with the exception of the arachne count, anyone else seeking them out would only be throwing their lives away.
The motorcycle sped on for almost two hours before finally arriving at the destination. Qianye noticed that this mine wasn’t on the common map of this region, but was one of the locations where Zhao Yuying had pointed out as potential mining sites. It seemed the dark races weren’t lacking in expert excavators either to have chosen the same place as Zhao Yuying without prior arrangements.
The buildings in front soon became clearer in their field of vision. Judging from its appearance, the scale of this mine was even larger than the black stone mine Qianye had razed, and it was also heavily guarded. Not only was it surrounded by numerous high walls, but the main gate was also ten meters tall with three towers constructed around it—their forbidding, black cannon muzzles could be seen from a distance.
What kind of mine was this? It was clearly a fortress!
The motorcycle’s movements were simply too conspicuous and had drawn the attention of the guards from a fair distance. Guns poked out of the embrasures in succession, and the fixed cannons on the towers began to turn slowly toward them.
“Are we going over just like that?” Qianye inquired.
“Yup, we’re going in just like that!” Zhao Yuying replied.
The rumble of the motorcycle engine escalated to its peak once again as the vehicle actually charged straight toward the main gates.