Destiny in Cinders

Seeing that Wu Qi was truly and properly dead, An Jing turned to the massive serpent. Using True Spirit Eyes and Ocular Blaze, he could tell that there was a modified human brain within its. Just like the fetus in the pregnant fiendspawn he once encountered, the human brain was independent from the beast despite being in its body.

”Seems like that fetal fiendspawn was heaven’s way of foreshadowing this. Had I been the slightest bit late, the serpent might’ve managed to advance to the Clearing Realm and evolved into a wyrm. I would be in for quite the grueling fight had that been the case.” An odd notion also surfaced in his mind at the sight of the human brain. ”There would be no way for me to use brute force against an enemy at the Clearing Realm. The human brain must be the beast’s biggest weakness. I probably would’ve identified this weakness in combat anyway and managed to defeat the wyrm as a Fortification martialist. Imagine how my reputation would’ve grown had that been the case!”

He thought about what happened at Riverside versus what could’ve happened. Right after he arrived at the city, he found his mother and made his move with a bang against Bejeweled, depriving Mo Li and the rest from using any of their trump cards, including the Fortification martialists in their coordinated battle formation. All Mo Li could fall back on were the formation discs. He couldn’t even access his other weapons or artifacts. Had An Jing been the slightest bit indecisive and allowed Mo Li access to everything in his arsenal, he would’ve toiled quite a bit before he managed to kill his target.

There was no doubt in him that he would’ve achieved his objective regardless, and the same was the case even if the serpent had evolved into a wyrm. Had he achieved all that, he would’ve overcome two more ”human tribulations” of the Clearing Realm. While all this still paled in comparison to his tribulations at Keensight, in a way, that didn’t really count since his master, Ming Guangchen, and You Ruhui’s tribulations were also conflated as his.

Eventually, he shook his head and discarded the notions. ”That would’ve been far too much trouble. I would rather kill them decisively than let all these tribulations build up and layer upon each other. I need to use the rest of my time to cultivate.”

He was getting more and more familiar with how his celestial arc operated. The lifearc itself couldn’t twist the desires and beliefs of others to manufacture tribulations for him. All it could do was amplify things that were already brewing in the first place. Given how chaotic the natural state of the world was, the celestial arc he bore always had a tribulation to throw his way. The tribulations started off as mere seeds, but the amplification caused them to mature into proper and terrifying fruits of tribulation.

Despite all that, as long as An Jing dealt with them quickly and left nothing to fester, they weren’t a massive issue. For instance, he dealt with Riverside’s predicament without wasting too much time in digging up the truth, striking at the guild first before using Yvelbane’s sight to find the location where fiend qi gathered, leading to his eventual assault on the True Fiend Cult. His swift action had prevented a hypothetically fully prepared Mo Li or the evolved wyrm from ever coming into existence. Preventing illnesses was much better than treating it, after all. When it came to true tribulations, the only viable solution was to quash them before they had a chance to silently amass momentum and power.

”I can’t tell if you’re an innocent wrapped up into this or a fellow follower of the True Fiend Cult. Either way, I can’t save you. All I can do is to grant you lasting rest.” An Jing focused his gaze as he used Ocular Blaze, igniting the spirit qi of the human brain within the massive serpent and causing it to melt into a bloody pool of liquid. Then, fiend qi shot out of the serpent toward the sky. Perhaps even the serpent itself wasn’t aware that there was so much of this terrifying fiend qi in its body.

”An Jing!” Yvelbane cried, alarmed, ”Something’s off! Some greater heavenly fiend is trying to use that fiend qi to transmit a message!”

”Huh?” An Jing focused even more and held the ability token close to his chest. He had been ready to summon Frostwhite Dart for a swift escape. ”Are you sure the fiend is just trying to transmit information? They can’t send power here remotely from a distance, right?”

”How’s that even possible? We’re still within Grand Chen’s borders. The fiend last time at Direlife Manor had to expend lots of power to summon the vilespawn fiend and wasn’t even able to summon a proper avatar,” Yvelbane said, filled with certainty. ”It’s probably trying to say some nonsense to you. I need you to buy some time. I still have the shard of the grand pentaphase destruction divine-armament sword. I already stripped it clean of the things we can use, but it’s still filled with leftover psychic intent. I’ll use it to teach the fiend a harsh lesson!”

”Sounds good.” An Jing put his trust into the sword soul and held the ability token in hand tightly as he faced the shadowy figure inside the abyssal hole. The figure was someone that An Jing recognized: Heavenly Fiend Liferot.

When a fruit became far too ripe, it would ferment and rot. The oils and sugars within would sink to the bottom of the fruit, drawing in large amounts of bacterial lifeforms to initiate the process of decay. Once a blade of grass fell to the ground below that was teeming with life, it would never come back to life, no matter how clean or pure it was. Instead, the cycle of slow rot would begin, starting from the crawling tendrils of fungi. All this was part of the fundamental nature of life. Everything was in the process of dying and destruction, part of the cycle of fall and rot. The lifeforms that caused the process of rot itself were life within life.

An odd scent of apparent sweetness that one might smell from rotting fruits wafted through the air, coming from the shadowy figure beyond the bottomless hole that formed on the massive serpent’s carcass.

”So it was you all along.” The greater heavenly fiend spoke with a tone of surprise and realization, a quality that sounded all too human. Had An Jing not known what he was dealing with in advance, he would think that this was just some fiend follower speaking. If he heard that voice on the streets, he wouldn’t even link it to heavenly fiends at all.

Without a second thought, he sent a bolt of lightning in the figure’s direction. Yet, the figure simply evaded it, causing it to strike the abyss without resulting in anything.

Liferot smiled and said, ”You were the missing one back at Direlife Canyon. The vilespawn fiend I manifested was eradicated by some kind of lightning attack. Seems like it could well be the pentaphase lightning you wield. You really pop up everywhere, don’t you? To think that you’ll get in my way in a distant, rural corner like this.”

The fact that it recognized pentaphase lightning, and potentially even Jin Yanhua, was what made its anger surge. Hearing that, An Jing figured many things out. ”From the sound of it, this heavenly fiend isn’t aware of Endmost Sky. But they must know that a particular group of people have it out for them. That should be the mission of Sister Jin and my master. Is Endmost Sky’s purpose to fight the heavenly fiends? Master did say that apart from trying to find You Ruhui at Direlife Manor, he was also there for a mission related to heavenly fiends.”

While An Jing had killed the vilespawn fiend with a mysticsky lightning talisman rather than his own ability, it wasn’t a bad thing to leave the heavenly fiend’s misunderstanding uncorrected. It couldn’t hurt to let the fiend think this was how An Jing got into contact with Jin Yanhua.

”Why have you come?” An Jing fired off another lightning-charged flying sword with his sword case, yet it didn’t even so much as shake the abyssal, fiendish hole. ”Are you holding a grudge because I killed your pet?”

Liferot didn’t respond. While the abyss seemed completely void of anything, An Jing could feel something within it observing him.

A reply came after a while. ”I see now. Seems like you could be the armament master after all. You were the one who called Yvelbane forth. You bear one of the fragments.”

”Wow, it sure took you long enough to figure this out.” An Jing didn’t reveal the slightest look of surprise. He knew from the moment he revealed that he was the bearer of a divine arc that he would draw everyone’s attention, including that of his enemies and the heavenly fiends. All of them drew their own conclusions regarding his supposed divine arc.

An Jing believed that the most that the heavenly fiends were able to guess was that he had obtained a fragment of the sword from Direlife Manor. There was no way they knew about the hilt of the broken sword, which served as the fulcrum of Yvelbane’s being and consciousness. Feeling bold, he taunted, ”I keep hearing that heavenly fiends are deviously cunning. It’s starting to seem like you’re no smarter than the average fellow.”

”Our deviousness most likely stems from the deviousness of humanity itself. The same applies to our vulgarity. We heavenly fiends are creatures that know not our true nature.” Liferot didn’t even deny it and even launched into a discussion. ”Humans, on the other hand, are blessed with physical bodies of flesh, filled with talent and imbued with mind and will. Unlike beings like us, you acquire attachment and differentiation throughout your lives and achieve much greater clarity, thereby affirming your own natures. I can tell that you’re rather disappointed in humankind. You wish to kill everything. Since that’s the case, why not join us? At the very least, we heavenly fiends have no hierarchy to speak of. We can be bargained and negotiated with. We can fulfill your deepest wishes.” 𝑓𝑟ℯℴ𝓂

”Man... Heavenly fiends really have no idea how to corrupt people’s hearts, do they?” An Jing wanted to do a double take halfway through. Why would he be disappointed in humanity as a whole? So what if shitty people like Mo Li and the leader from the True Fiend Cult or organizations like Grand Chen and the Heavenly Demon Cult existed? Couldn’t he just kill them all and call it a day? So far, he already had a track record of killing most people that disappointed him and making a mental hit list of those he presently couldn’t deal with. He could already achieve his goals with his sword in hand. What need did he have for the heavenly fiends?

”You weren’t one of those who would easily be corrupted to begin with,” Liferot said. ”Those susceptible to such means are those with many doubts for the future, those with no firm resolve. You, on the other hand, have never held doubts before.”

”And now you’re just stating the fucking obvious.” An Jing’s patience ran thin. ”Well, just watch. One day, I’ll kill off all of you.”

”Yes, this is exactly what I’m talking about,” Liferot praised. ”Such clear resolve. You are hard to corrupt indeed.”

”An Jing, sword up!” Yvelbane said from his sea of consciousness, its tone filled to the brim with killing intent. ”Don’t forget that they’re all offshoots of the supreme heartfiend! Rhetoric is their strong suit! Don’t humor them. There is but one way to deal with them! Kill! Eradicate! Slaughter!”

Though An Jing felt that there wasn’t much else that the heavenly fiend could say to him, Yvelbane was right. There was nothing left to do but kill. He only bothered to converse with Liferot to buy time, and there was no longer a need to keep up the act.

As he raised his arm, streams of crimson and gold lethal qi flowed through his body as Culling took form in his hand. The aspects of the five phases began to circulate, from metal to wood, from wood to earth, from earth to water, and from water to fire. A deep, dark singularity manifested at the tip of his sword.

”Grand pentaphase destruction sword intent!” Even Liferot was surprised to see it. ”To think that—”

Before the fiend could finish, the divine-armament sword of destruction unleashed countless sword beams that pierced through the void, delivering a powerful stream of pitch-black destructive sword intent that bore through everything and sent sparks of destruction in every direction! The abyssal hole that was the source of the heavenly fiend’s manifestation was severed by the sword intent, cutting off the stream of fiend qi from the serpent’s head at its source and reducing it to nothing.