Thirty seconds passed, then the sight of something resembling a mountain being cut and thrown into the air emerged, crashing into the ground. Everything happened in an uncontrolled manner, as abruptly as possible.
The whale took a light leap before the impact and spat a lot of blood as a consequence, but they had Ruri on their back and couldn’t avoid it. As for the hundreds of unconscious half-demons... if they weren’t very injured before, now they had truly broken several bones.
The whale looked at them rolling on the ground with a strange expression, but everyone was somehow alive. Soon, Alm and Bruno gathered everyone using Qi and looked ahead. Before them was a gigantic dome that glowed in a bluish hue; it was the last realm to be visited, the realm of the seas.
That place was obviously closed, with less than two months to go before it opened and everyone could enter. In the face of the powerful spatial laws of its barrier, it should be impossible for any demon to enter. And for them, it was no different... but they would have to create a miracle, or everyone would die.
Alm and Bruno focused on their instinctive senses. They had just over a minute for the demons to arrive.
’Almin is approaching rapidly...’ Bruno commented, sensing through the array, and both sighed mentally, hoping there was enough time.
They took steps in front of the barrier and activated their Yin and Yang tattoos to the limit. Since acquiring the second level of the Supreme Yin and Yang Collector Cultivation Technique, they had tried to study and comprehend it several times, but it always ended the same way. Its description was something considered impossible for the two.
’Yin is the definition of end and rebirth; Yang is the flourishing of a new perspective and the continuation of universal will. Although opposites, they are sides of the same coin. Thus, they must merge with the world, returning to the primordial state.’
Bruno muttered the words that defined the entire concept for understanding the second level. It was clear that Yin and Yang should merge... but how the hell would they do something like that? Bruno wondered.
’We are two parts of the same consciousness, perfectly divided into opposite poles. We tried before, I can’t even feel the Yang of the world, and you are the same but oppositely.’ Alm mentally murmured. ’Uniting the two poles... kind of happened before in the main quests. But that happened without us having any consciousness; we only realized that we were one again when everything was over and we separated.’
Alm and Bruno focused on their tattoos and soon felt a universal pressure on their heads; it was death rapidly approaching, along with the weight of trying to do something, and they had no idea how...
Ten tense seconds passed, then the whale turned to the horizon. From the upper layers, they saw the laws of the winds cut and fracture space uncontrollably at high speed.
’She did it... or almost...’ Bruno muttered.
Inside the realm of winds, due to Langrum’s discovered talent, the rune serving as the core of that place was left with her. They had no great use for that rune; maybe Ruri could learn a bit, but that would be in the future. Studying the laws of the winds seemed like a waste of time; so the idea was for Langrum to slowly study the rune without removing the seal or using its power.
But, in this moment of despair, they had Almin throw all the Yang pills he had, and Loeus deliver everything he had to Langrum. All the power of her bloodlines would be put to the test, and she received all the Yang her body could withstand. Then the mental seal was removed by Almin, and Langrum had to rely only on her endurance and undeveloped talent to command the laws and bring everyone, even the hundreds of half-wyverns, there.
The speed of the laws of divine winds coming from that rune was multiple times faster than the explosion of fire and electricity they unleashed before. That was the main reason Langrum couldn’t control it and also why the power kept increasing every second. Until finally, she would lose control, decreeing the end for everyone.
Alm and Bruno focused on the horizon and sighed. Langrum was in the front, but her radiant natural green skin couldn’t be seen; her entire being was twisted red. Her state was as terrible as the whale’s. She endured bitterly with only her willpower those laws, and her life was as fragile as a candle flame in the wind.
Right behind her, they saw only a black mass. All the surviving half-wyverns that were summoned by Runula joined together, forming a shield of flesh and protecting one another. Scales and skin no longer existed on their bodies. The uncontrolled winds punished them severely, and even their bones could be seen through their wounds. Almin, Loeus, Runula, and Deryu were being shielded at the center.
A dense, draconic bloodline emanated clear as day from them. Everyone was alive, and if this tribulation didn’t kill them, they would become several times more powerful with this new awakening.
The whale heavily huffed, and a massive amount of Qi was converted into his body as they focused. Ruri was placed on the ground. Then, the earth beneath their feet broke, and they leaped with all their might in a straight line towards the rapidly approaching group.
In five seconds, they entered the chaotic laws of the winds. They no longer had significant defenses, so the wind blades punished them directly; but they didn’t slow down and just advanced with red and eerie eyes.
The sound of all the whale’s bones being violently shattered echoed. Langrum’s eyes were the only parts she could control, so they moved almost instinctively, and she saw that round and disfigured figure approaching; relief washed over her entire soul, and she trembled as her consciousness darkened.
The whale passed through the cutting winds of the blades in the most brutal way possible. His tattoos were activated and absorbed all potentially lethal wind laws, but everything was out of control at an almost indefensible level.
Then, he finally reached the center of everything and grabbed the unruly rune with a swift motion, placing it directly in the spatial inventory. The power of the two domination techniques merged; soon, everything was forcefully sealed again.
All the laws around everyone began to disperse in all directions. The whale converted a large amount of Qi into his body again. Despite his state resembling a mass of minced meat, his meridians were protected and intact. They threw Langrum into the black mass, and with a Qi explosion, they directed everyone’s fall towards the side of the dome.
BOOM!
Everyone fell like a black meteor on the ground. But the physical bodies of these half-wyverns protecting one another were abnormal. There was no risk of them dying.
Unfortunately, the whale didn’t have that protection, and they fell a few meters away with a muffled thud. They tried to get up, but their state made it impossible to tell if they were truly alive... or if they still had muscles or bones; everything seemed to blend inside them.
With a bloody sigh, they gave up trying to get up and rolled on the ground, approaching the spatial barrier.
Almin, Runula, and Deryu looked at that scene and swallowed hard. They could barely recognize the whale...
’Gather everyone quickly! We have less than a minute; we’ll have to enter that realm, or we die!’ The message through the array reached the dazed Almin.
Alm and Bruno crawled, but for some unknown reason, they didn’t go in a straight line. They passed by the unconscious little girl, tried to grab her, but their arms couldn’t move correctly. After a second, as if sensing their approach and intention, Ruri moved, still unconscious, in their direction and clung to that minced meat mass.
With little strength left, they saw that they were two meters from the barrier and only moved their two arms towards it, and the Yin and Yang tattoos lit up.
In the sky, the laws seemed to stir; it was a premonition of the arrival of a sea of powerful demons. They might still have thirty seconds...
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Seconds passed slowly... five seconds... ten seconds...
Nothing changed, and nothing worked. They tried everything they had to merge Yin and Yang, even used their wounded souls to the limit, but it was all in vain. All their consciousness was focused, but quickly, a desperate feeling began to sprout in them.
In this suffocating moment, they only felt warmth enveloping their bodies. Both felt Ruri tremble and cling tightly to them; they sighed; the will to keep her alive and well persisted, renewed, and increased to the limit.
Then, something resembling a gentle breeze invaded their mental sea.
The two souls floated in the mental sea... then both felt, startled, a small figure appearing quite close. They turned in that direction, astonished... there was a mortal soul of a little girl floating and rapidly approaching them.
’What... is she unconscious?’ Bruno and Alm murmured simultaneously in a strangely synchronized way.
Ruri seemed to be drawn towards them; in a second, she was almost in front of them. ’We brought her here... could this be another method of using the divine soul, similar to when we sleep?’ they both said.
Ruri’s soul had closed eyes, her consciousness was extinguished, and only her pure soul was present there. Alm and Bruno saw her approaching closer and closer, not understanding what it was.
But soon, something seemed to fill their minds. It was something unknown but should be the last hope. They watched her gentle face getting very close, and then both thought together.
’I have to make it! I won’t fail again!’
Something seemed to flow through them. Suddenly, Ruri opened her arms, enveloping the two, and a light covered Alm and Bruno.
At that moment, outside, the whale’s eyes opened. Its gaze was firm, and there were no longer two minds; they were one again.
Their Yin and Yang tattoos lit up at maximum strength. Then, with a trembling movement, the two hands joined, and the two tattoos touched.
At that exact moment, the heavenly laws subtly reacted. A perfect and impossible union emerged in the world, breaking all rules and concepts of the living.
In a place far, far away, two golden eyes opened like immaculate suns. However, it happened so quickly that she couldn’t pinpoint exactly where it originated. The queen had sensed a few strange things in her universe before, but they were insignificant—this, however, caught her attention.
"Yin and Yang united... did she finally manage it?" the feminine voice murmured, her gaze shifting elsewhere. Inside a golden castle, in a dark chamber, she saw a beautiful woman seated in a lotus position, her fists pulsing with twin tattoos.
"She must have taken the first step. That place, with the bloodline of those two phoenixes, should help her complete it."
Back in the abyss, no aura or anything flashy appeared, but a chilling feeling flowed, and the laws of the waters froze. Quickly, the barrier opened as if the spatial laws were bowing before something indescribable.
Almin and everyone who could walk ran desperately. The whale then levitated from the ground; with its last strength, something invisible extended and covered everyone there. With a movement of this power, everyone entered in a second. Then the barrier closed, and in the same second, the skies were covered by demons.