Against The Heavens 104 A Different Appearance, The Same Look.

The forest he was in stretched out for quite a distance in each direction, at least a few tens of kilometers. At the northern end of the forest stood a tall and incredibly wide mountain that stretched into the clouds at about its halfway point, making it impossible to see how tall it truly was. The southern, western, and eastern ends of the forest all ended in separate cities that were very similar to the one Li Yang had just been in, the main difference between them was that these cities only had three towers standing at the center of the city.

Li Yang swept all three cities with narrowed eyes, carefully examining them. Fang Ying was most likely in one of these cities, he only had to figure out which one. He inspected the cities for a few seconds before his gaze locked onto the eastern one, the edges of his mouth curling up.

"Trouble always did have a penchant for following us."

It was a bit hard to see from his position but he was able to just barely see a small plume of smoke and dust rising up from the center of the eastern city, the air around the plume distorting slightly, a clear sign that someone was battling there. He swallowed some more pills and took out a few more Spirit Stones to further increase the speed at which his Qi refilled, jumping down from the tree and das.h.i.+ng towards the eastern city.

--

Fang Ying felt like she sensed a warm sensation sweep over her just before the transportation array activated, but she was unable to ascertain if she truly sensed anything because the array activated the moment she felt it. As such she chose to drop it and focus on the important task she had ahead of her, reaching the meeting point that she had set up. She wanted to see that warm smile again, she wanted those black hole-like eyes to look at her with that loving gaze that warmed her entire body.

The array brought her group of five away from Cloud King city and sent them up to the Cloud G.o.d's Garden, to the city known as Wind's Wave. The room they arrived in was an exact copy of the room they had just left, completely empty with nothing but the lines and runes of the array covering the walls and floor.

The five of them stepped out of the room and walked past the two guards, Fang Ying taking the lead as they left the tower and entered a somewhat busy star-shaped plaza. But just as Fang Ying wanted to tell the others that she was going to move faster, a group of people stepped in front of them and stopped them.

"Fairy Ying, Brother Zheng, I did not expect you to choose to come here."

Standing in front of them was a group of people from the Puppet G.o.d sect, all of them neatly lined up behind the one man standing at the front. The leader of the group was very familiar to Fang Ying, he was Xiong Xieren, the future patriarch of the Puppet G.o.d sect. Xiong Xieren was a tall man who was a little over two meters tall, he had a stubble of white hair on his chin that produced a nice contrast to his black eyes and shoulder length black hair. Fang Ying didn't wish to chat with him, but due to Xiong Xieren's status and her current relations.h.i.+p with the Tian clan, she had to at least give him the bare minimum politeness.

"I am just as surprised to see you here, Elder Brother Xieren. I hope you'll forgive me, but I have something I must do, so I won't stay here for long."

Fang Ying smiled politely, but in truth, she did not care much for this Xiong Xieren. He had the same black eyes as her beloved, but the look in them was completely different. Li Yang always looked at her with love and care, even when he died because of her did he look at her with nothing but love and care. He also never pretended, he was straightforward and direct, his pride higher than the heavens.

This Xiong Xieren, on the other hand, pretended to be cordial and humble when in front of others, hiding his scheming personality beneath a layer of fake kindness, a perfect patriarch for a large sect. And his eyes were filled with l.u.s.t and greed whenever he looked at her, he was like a child who saw a treasure and decided that he had to keep it for himself. Fang Ying stepped forward to walk past him, but Xiong Xieren stretched out his arm, stopping her with an apologetic expression before casting a sideways glance at Tian Zheng.

"I'm sorry Fairy Ying, but I must ask that you return to Cloud King city and go somewhere else. My Puppet G.o.d sect has decided that it is time that we are allowed to harvest some resources here. Brother Zheng, I am sure that you don't need me to tell you anything else?"

Xiong Xieren wanted to place his hand on Fang Ying's shoulder, but Langshen bared his teeth and started to growl the moment Xiong Xieren started to move his arm closer. Tian Zheng's expression twisted slightly after hearing Xiong Xieren's words, their meaning very clear, stay here and we will fight you.

The group of people standing behind Xiong Xieren was almost three times as large as their group, and considering that Tian Zheng would have to put all his focus on Xiong Xieren, there was really no way for their group to win if they were to fight. There was also the fact that there wasn't really a need for them to fight with Xiong Xieren's group, the only reason he had chosen to come to this continent was that Fang Ying wanted to come here. With all these facts clear to him, Tian Zheng shrugged his shoulders and shook his head lightly at Fang Ying.

"It's a shame, Junior Sister Ying, but it seems like we will have to return. Why don't you tell me what you wished to acquire by coming here, I will have the clan use all our resources to find it for you once this compet.i.tion is over."

If he had the entire clan search for whatever she was looking for, there should be no way that they would be unable to find and acquire it for her. He could show her his charitable side and she would get what she wanted, Tian Zheng saw it as the perfect trade. But Fang Ying proceeded to take an action he had never expected from her, she pulled out her weapon, a pure white Jian sword covered in red veins.

"No, I will not leave. If you are adamant about making me return, then you leave me no choice but to carve a path directly through you."

As she spoke, the Qi within Fang Ying's body started to seethe and churn, the blood of the weaker cultivators in the area starting to be affected, almost flowing in the opposite direction. Tian Zheng's expression distorted further due to the unexpected actions of Fang Ying, Xiong Xieren's expression, on the other hand, sunk and turned a bit colder.

"Fairy Ying, I like you quite a bit, but that does not mean that I will not use force if you decide to act against us. I advise you with all my heart, just leave, nothing up here is worth fighting against us."

Even if he somewhat fancied Fang Ying, he would not allow her and the Tian clan to throw a wrench in his sects plans to enter the Ocean G.o.d's graveyard, he would kill Fang Ying and Tian Zheng here if he had to. Xiong Xieren was the future patriarch of the Puppet G.o.d sect, he had reached this position not by birthright but by fighting for it. Among the various future sect and clan leaders, he was among the stronger ones. He was only at the peak of the Immortal Rebirth realm, but even if he were to fight without using any of his puppets, he could still match someone at the middle stage of the Primordial Rune realm. He would be even stronger if he used his puppets, he was what one would call an extremely rare prodigy.

Fang Ying was only at the middle stage of the Immortal Rebirth realm, and although she had shown that she could match someone at the early stage of the Primordial Rune realm, she was not Xiong Xieren's match. Tian Zheng wanted to say something, but before he got the chance, Fang Ying raised her sword.

"If I get to meet him again, I won't mind even if I have to end up fighting your entire sect. Move."

Not only Xiong Xieren was somewhat shocked when he heard her reply, Tian Zheng and the others were also shocked. She had come here not to find a rare resource, but to meet a man? And her statement made it clear that this man was tremendously dear to her, to the point where she would even go against the entire Puppet G.o.d sect just to meet him. Whoever this man was, he was clearly more than just a friend or a family member.

Tian Zheng's and Xiong Xieren's expression distorted even further, especially Tian Zheng's. Fang Ying had already been decided as one of his future wives, so he thought that even though she was distant to him now, she would warm up in the future. But now it seemed like she had never actually intended to follow the orders of the sect, she would never marry him. To someone as proud and arrogant as Tian Zheng, this was a tremendous blow to his confidence.

Xiong Xieren narrowed his eyes, his message clear, they would not back down. The atmosphere of the area immediately grew tense, the citizens quickly fleeing from the area so that they didn't get dragged into the ensuing fight. Fang Ying looked at Xiong Xieren for a short second before giving a fractional nod of her head, her right arm turning into a blur as she slashed out with her sword.

A crimson tidal wave followed her sword, the stench of blood spreading through the area as the tidal wave descended onto Xiong Xieren and his group, the blood within two of the weaker cultivators violently ejecting itself from their bodies and becoming part of the tidal wave. Langshen let out a loud howl at the same time, invisible blades made from compressed s.p.a.ce appearing amidst Xiong Xieren's group, instantly killing three people by slicing them into tiny pieces. Fang Ying was not as fond of fighting as Li Yang was, but when she truly started fighting, she was just as ferocious as he was.

Xiong Xieren's group of 16 instantly shrunk down to 11, his brows furrowing slightly as he looked at the tidal wave. He waved his right hand, a puppet in the shape of a slim man who had green hair and wore violet armor appearing at his side. He had the puppet deal with the invisible spatial blades while he himself dealt with the tidal wave of blood. He clapped both his hands, causing a shockwave to ripple through the air and tear the tidal wave apart, turning it into a b.l.o.o.d.y mist.

He then stepped forward, vanis.h.i.+ng from sight and instantly appearing directly in front of Fang Ying. He stomped the ground with his right leg and pushed out his right arm, aiming his palm directly at Fang Ying's chest. The palm contained so much force that it even caused s.p.a.ce around it to tremble, a faint black mist seeping out of Xiong Xieren's skin.

But before the palm managed to touch Fang Ying, it was intercepted by a different palm that came from behind Fang Ying, twisting around her body and blocking the attack. A circle of fire burst forth as the two palms made contact, the stone ground in the city melting under the heat of the fire. Xiong Xieren looked at the man who had blocked his attack, Tian Zheng, his eyes narrowing faintly.

"Brother Zheng, are you really planning to get in the way now?"

Xiong Xieren's group had already lost five people, but that was mostly due to the fact that they had been caught unprepared, the battle was still heavily in their favor. Tian Zheng could only let out a sigh, putting on a pair of gloves made from tiny brown scales.

"A, what can I say? I can't just let you kill someone from my Tian clan in front of me, so I have to take action. Junior Sister Ying, you should focus on fleeing as fast as you can, they should calm down somewhat after you have left the area."

Tian Zheng's pride had undeniably been hurt when he learned that Fang Ying loved someone else, but he was Tian Zheng, the future patriarch of the Tian clan. There was no point in dwelling on this, he would simply move past it and focus on his actual task, protecting and securing the future of the Tian clan. Xiong Xieren's expression turned from grim to calm as he gave a slight nod of his head, a gray trident appearing in his grasp.

"So be it. Today I will see how much your strength has improved since our last duel."

With Xiong Xieren's words as the signal, the rest of the disciples in the area pulled out their weapons, Fang Ying's group of five plus one Demonic beast facing Xiong Xieren's group of 11. Xiong Xieren clenched the trident and focused his gaze on Tian Zheng, preparing to stab out when a sudden cough behind him caught his attention, causing him to glance behind him, his pupils shrinking as he did so.

Of the 10 people remaining behind him, the six weakest had blood pouring out of their eyes and ears. But the strange part was that besides the one who had just coughed, a mixture of blood and organ pieces spewing out of her mouth, the others didn't seem to notice that they were bleeding. The one who coughed looked like she wanted to scream after seeing that she had coughed up blood and pieces of her organs, but no sound came out as she opened her mouth, only more blood.

Her eyes then turned dull and lifeless, her body collapsing to the ground like a sack of potatoes. Less than a second after she collapsed, the five remaining people also started to cough, blood and small pieces of their lungs spewing forth. They too wanted to scream, but it seemed like it had already become impossible for them to make any sound. They quickly collapsed to the ground, dead.

Even worse, after they collapsed, their skin started to dissolve in front of the shocked eyes of all the onlookers, revealing that their flesh had turned a light pink in color and was in the process of melting. Xiong Xieren's eyes landed on the b.l.o.o.d.y mist that Fang Ying's tidal wave had become. He drew in a quick breath, the faint scent of fragrant apples tickling his nose, causing his expression to violently distort.

"Poison. You know how to use poison?!"

Xiong Xieren could not help but be utterly shocked. He knew that Fang Ying could use the law of blood and even fuse with Langshen to utilize the law of s.p.a.ce, but he had never received any reports that she was able to use the law of poison, much less that she was so proficient in it that she was able to hide it in her law of blood while attacking. Xiong Xieren quietly started to get a bit nervous, tapping his interspatial ring and connecting his mind to a communication jade he was keeping inside it, quickly calling for the other disciples of the Puppet G.o.d sect to come to him.

It wasn't just Xong Xieren that was shocked, Tian Zheng and the others were too. Fang Ying had been part of the Tian clan for several years already, but even they had never heard that she could use the law of poison. Just how long had she been hiding it from them, and what else was she hiding? Fang Ying did not care about their surprise, setting her eyes on one of the four people who remained after she poisoned the others, a chubby and brown-haired man at the late stage of the Immortal Rebirth realm. If too many of these people remained when she fled, they might chase after her and prevent her from meeting up with Li Yang, so it was best to kill as many as possible before she fled.

She took a step forward, s.p.a.ce around her rippling as Langshen teleported her through s.p.a.ce, making her appear directly behind her target. Fang Ying slashed out with her sword, the man quickly reacting by turning around and using his handaxe to deflect the attack, the power behind Fang Ying's attack forcing him to take a step backward. He also felt his mind grow a bit lighter after blocking the attack, the faint scent of roses tickling his nose.

The man quickly channeled his Qi through his body to get rid of the poison, charging forward and raising his arm at the same time, slas.h.i.+ng his axe downward towards Fang Ying's skull. While this was taking place, Tian Zheng had started fighting with Xiong Xieren, the other people also finding opponents of their own, chaos breaking out in the city.

Langshen let out a low growl, s.p.a.ce above Fang Ying turning completely solid for a short second as the axe collided with it. The man managed to shatter the solidified s.p.a.ce after a short second, but it had bought Fang Ying enough time to dash into the bossom of the man, aiming an upwards diagonal slash at the man's waist. At the same time as she slashed at him, s.p.a.ce behind the man rippled, Langshen appearing behind him and attempting to bite onto the man's neck.

The man's expression turned completely solemn as he let go of his axe and twisted his body to the left. He punched downwards with his right fist and sent out a backhanded punch with his left arm. A thin layer of metal surrounded the man's right fist just before it made contact with Fang Ying's sword, protecting it as he pushed her sword down. A layer of sharp wind spinning at high speed surrounded his left fist as it approached Langshen, threatening to slice him up if it were to hit him.

Langshen let out a somewhat unwilling growl, s.p.a.ce around him distorting as he vanished before the attack could hit him, appearing again a few meters away. With the man's metal coated fist pus.h.i.+ng down her sword, Fang Ying decided to simply let go of the sword, grabbing onto the man's arm with her left arm, violet and crimson light covering her hand as she poured poison into the man's arm, using her control over the law of blood to rapidly spread it through his body.

While her left arm was poisoning the man, she stretched her right arm towards his neck. As she stretched our her right arm, the sword she had dropped suddenly vanished into a ripple in s.p.a.ce, appearing in her grasp again, the tip of it right in front of the man's throat.

The man quickly tilted his head to the side, a layer of metal covering his throat as a strong gust of wind pushed the tip of the blade to the side. But with Fang Ying's poison trying to corrode his body from the inside, he had to divert a large amount of his Qi to negate the poison, resulting in his defense being weaker than it should be. The sword was pushed to the side, but not enough to completely miss his throat, the blade slicing through the metal defense and leaving a cut on the side of the man's throat.

The man jumped backward and used his law of metal to st.i.tch up the wound with fine threads of metal, temporarily slowing the bleeding while he focused on dealing with the poison that entered his throat due to the attack. The man's expression was grim as he looked at Fang Ying. He wasn't weak, he was someone who could even resist someone at the middle stage of the Primordial Immortal realm if he gave it his all. Yet now, when he was facing Fang Ying and Langshen, he couldn't help but feel suppressed.

Xiong Xieren also saw that things weren't going too well for the man, waving his hand and causing two puppets to appear at his side, one in the shape of a spider and the other in the shape of a tiger. He needed to use two of his four main humanoid puppets to suppress Tian Zheng, the other two were currently away on a mission he had given him, so these were the only puppets he currently had on him that he could spare to help the man.

But just as he was about to send the puppets to aid the man, a thunderous sound resounded over the city, catching everyone's attention. A simple metal spear pierced through the buildings around the plaza, heading for the man that Fang Ying was fighting, its speed so fast that it had turned into a gray blur.

The spear looked simple, but the man was not dumb enough to believe that a simple spear would be able to move so fast that it could cleanly pierce through the buildings like that. He took several steps back, two black handaxes appearing in his grasp as he crossed them in front of his chest. He wanted to play things safe, so he also swiped his interspatial ring and caused a puppet in the shape of a stone turtle to appear in front of him. He didn't specialize in the law of puppets so he was unable to use puppets in combat, but he was proficient enough in the law to use the puppets for defense like this.

The spear collided with the turtle, the tip of the spear disintegrating and unleas.h.i.+ng a violent burst of golden flames that turned the outer layer of the turtle into nothingness. The flames immediately drew the attention of all the cultivators in the area, as these flames could only be used by a Demonic beast or cultivator who had a thick bloodline of the Golden Crow. They of course also drew the attention of Fang Ying, but for a completely different reason. She could feel a very familiar aura from these golden flames, an aura that was very near and dear to her.

After the flames scorched away the outer layer of the turtle's defense, the middle part of the spear disintegrated, an icy mist spewing forth and a.s.saulting the turtle. The icy mist not only froze the parts of the turtle that hadn't been scorched by the golden flames, but even the surrounding Qi and air also started to freeze, dropping to the ground as small droplets that shattered when they hit the ground. Fang Ying once again sensed that familiar aura, her heart starting to run completely rampant.

After the mist froze the turtle, the last piece of the spear disintegrated, a thick bolt of golden lightning roaring forward and piercing through the frozen turtle. The bolt flew toward the man standing behind the turtle, roaring as if it was the wrath of a vengeful dragon. The golden lightning crashed into the man's crossed axes, lifting him off his feet and throwing him backward until he crashed into one of the towers. He was unharmed, but quite badly shaken.

Had he not used the turtle to block, he was uncertain how much damage he would have taken from blocking the attack. The burst of fire and ice would eat away at his defense, weakening it so that the bolt of lightning could pierce through it, a rather clever attack.

Seeing this golden bolt of lightning, Fang Ying felt her heart skip a few beats as it nearly stopped, a pair of black hole-like eyes surfacing in her mind. She quickly turned towards the direction the spear had come from, calling out in a loud voice.

"Langshen!"

Langshen could easily understand what she meant, s.p.a.ce around the two of them rippling for a short moment before they vanished from the area, leaving behind the shocked disciples of the Tian clan and the Puppet G.o.d sect.

Fang Ying and Langshen appeared just beyond the walls that surrounded the city, at the edge of the forest. And standing only a few steps away from her was a young man with hair that looked like it was made from silky ice and crimson eyes that looked like scorching flames, three scars going diagonally down over his right eye. He looked quite different from how he did in the past, the colors of his hair an eyes completely different. But that loving look that she knew, that she had longed for all these years, was still the same.