"IT'S ALL YOUR FAULT!!" she said with a raspy cackled voice as blood lust thick enough to materialize appeared around her like a river of blood, with mournful souls wailing beneath it.
"If I offer you all to master as tribute, maybe he will answer?" she added with a colder tone as a malevolent smile appeared on her face as she eyed the five of them like chickens waiting for slaughter.
"Who's your master?" asked Wei Ying.
"Mmph, you're unworthy to know him, even that nosey organization you belong to is unworthy of his notice.." she said with a tone filled with zealot spirit towards whoever her master was and disdain for the Order.
"Now, I'm even more eager to meet him.." Wei Ying coyly said.
"I'll ensure you meet him, corpse intact.." Sect founder Feng Qiu coldly said as she took another step which caused the ground beneath her to crack as a red mist appeared from the crack beneath her feet.
She took another step, and more red mist appeared as it flowed into her.
"With things as they are, I have no need for you anymore.." she casually said as she faced the Wisteria tree.
She waved one of her hands as a giant red seal formed beneath her and the tree.
A gargantuan red mist that blew was produced from the seal along with a white icy mist which then flowed to founder Feng Qiu's body and enveloped her like a cocoon.
"Qingge, there's no need to.."Wei Ying casually said when she saw Zhang Qingge about to attack Feng Qiu while she was in the cocoon.
"Despite how she looks and how she was behaving, she is not careless enough to leave herself undefended. She would not have survived this long as a blood-fiend cultivator if she was... Besides her by herself is nothing much, but I feel something unsettling from that rune itself...."
"It doesn't seem entirely of her doing, maybe it's that master of hers.." she said as she carefully eyed her surroundings.
Wei Ying among the five had the highest cultivation base. She was well on her way to reaching the fourth stage of the palace realm. From what Yang Qing heard from Zhang Qingge after this fight she would be going into seclusion in preparation for the breakthrough with her promotion to the inner palace courts already underway.
Her judgment and senses were received with apt attention by the rest because of it, especially Yang Qing, who felt something move in his palace world the moment the rune appeared.
The object that showed a reaction to the rune was the green orb that the enigmatic saint-grade artifact, green cocoon had left with him when he interacted with her, saying it was a gift for him to use when the time came, which he didn't know what that time was, but he was all too glad to receive something from a saint grade treasure that seemed to have been alive for 1,000,000 years.
Whatever she gave, was bound to be useful. That orb flickered slightly the moment the rune appeared.
"If Wei Ying's guess is right, whoever her master is, isn't a simple character. They managed to turn her into a middle-stage palace realm expert, and the physique absorption technique was anything but simple.." Yang Qing muttered in deep contemplation, as he consumed yellow cloud-patterned peach fruit to quickly recover his expended qi.
The last technique he used on the sect master and the elders of the Ice Emerald Sect had expended two-thirds of his qi and for the fight ahead, he couldn't afford to run out even if he would not be an active participant in it.
As Yang Qing and the rest made their final preparations, the red rune flickered and disappeared, along with it the red and white mist being drained from the Wisteria tree that had a seismic transformation from what it once was.
In that short amount of time, it had transformed from a lustrous tree brimming with life and with vibrant blue and purple flowers adding to the pink radiant light that surrounded it, and it turned into a shriveled withered tree that seemed like it would be blown to dust by even the slightest wind.
It was dark grey and the flowers and leaves on it had all withered away, while its branches desiccated and turned to ash leaving only one main stump holding on.
"There is a spirit in there?!" Yang Qing muttered in shock as his pupils trained on the tree.
From the moment he saw the tree, he felt conflicting emotions toward it. One was disgust which he understood because of the resentment and blood that was produced from it, but the other was strange to him, something deep within him felt sympathy, which he didn't understand why until now..
"Seniors, Dai Chen, Qingee, in your fight could you drag it away from the tree..." Yang Qing hurriedly said as he saw them preparing to attack.
The red cocoon holding the Ice Emerald Sect seemed to have completed its job as it cracked releasing a chilling and blinding red light revealing the person from within it.
The Wisteria tree wasn't the only one to have a drastic transformation. From out of the cocoon came out a woman who looked to be in her late thirties.
She had silky smooth red hair that glittered like the stars in the sky gently cascading down her back. Her beauty was matchless, enough to mesmerize and befuddle the masses to the point they would gladly forsake their life, their kin, and their whole ancestry for the chance of gaining her favor.
She had milky white skin, red pupils that seemed to have been crafted from red gemstones, and a cold and aloof demeanor.
The lady stood there, silently, drawing everything to herself like a cold shining star that blinded the radiance of everything around her.
However, her moment was cut short, when a force of pure destruction charged towards her at terrifying speed.
"You overestimate yourself, child," the lady gently said as she casually raised her hand creating an oval red-blue crystalline object in front of her just in time to block a terrifying fist that came with enough force capable of reducing a hundred mountains to ash within an instant.
Boom!
A loud explosion was produced from the impact which rang out throughout the area. The red crystalline shield despite being less than an inch in thickness, held strong against the fist, without so much as a crack forming it as the lady indifferently gazed at the attacker.
"Is that so? I think you're the one who has overestimated herself, your shriveled human bark.." muttered the voice behind the fist.
Armageddon seismic pulse
The thunderous force behind the fist suddenly disappeared like it was sucked back into the fist itself only for a moment later, vibration roars that seemed to have been produced from the earth's scorching core were instantly produced by the fist which instantly shattered the red-blue crystalline shield.
With unmatched speed and power, the fist blazed on towards the lady's face, which had lost its previous casual indifference and now had a look of shock on it.
Swoosh!
The fist missed its target who reappeared a couple of meters away, with a red streaking line across her right cheek with a venomous glare on her face, as the wound instantly closed up.
"Good, good.." she icily said as the branch in her hand transformed into a crescent-shaped saber that had a white surface with a rusty edge that had red-black corroding mist being produced inches from it.
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