Chapter 342: Ritual
There was a massive difference between hunting level three magical beasts and branching experts, and it all boiled down to the Qi.
While magical beasts also had access to that energy, occasionally developing powerful abilities, they were limited to its rawest and most basic uses.
Instead, the Qi mastery was an entire field for cultivators, spanning from the uses of its rawest form to the most majestic techniques in the world.
The Qi mastery alone might be inferior to the magical beasts’ physical prowess, but proper techniques definitely weren’t. They were what made cultivators superior, and what Liam and Lancelot couldn’t possibly match even if they had access to rank 3 martial arts.
Dominic’s Qi would always make his techniques stronger.
Cultivators were also likely to wield a flexibility that magical beasts couldn’t possess. The latter were limited to what their species had provided, but the former could build complete arsenals able to deal with any situation.
Since Dominic was his Sect’s Disciplinary Elder, chances were that his arsenal was beyond complete. Not all of it might match his cultivation level, but that was hardly an exploitable weakness due to his superior Qi.
Liam had even seen how his techniques had fared against the level three snake, leading him to believe that a single martial art from Dominic would directly put him and Lancelot out of commission.
Therefore, the math couldn’t be clearer. Dominic’s arsenal probably had no flaws or aspects where Liam and Lancelot could surpass him. Unlike the snake, there was no size or lack of agility they could exploit, meaning that no winning or even viable strategies existed.
Except that there was something Liam and Lancelot could use, something that had nothing to do with strength or battles in general.
Dominic likely wouldn’t hesitate against Liam, but not Lancelot. The latter was a genius famous throughout the eastern region, and probably the entire Kingdom. He was also the crown jewel of a Sect near the Inner Circles, one Dominic had to respect.
Dominic could defeat Lancelot, but he couldn’t kill him or hurt him too badly out of fear of the retaliations that could befall him and the Shrouded Desert Sect.
Politics was a double-edged sword, one that Liam found pointless, but that undoubtedly existed, and that he could wield now no differently than any other weapon in his hunts.
Which was why Liam had remained behind, hidden by the faint white glow around him and the trees. His body had also grown colder on its own, suppressing his presence, rendering him as motionless as stone while he waited for the right opportunity to arrive.
Eyes were useless with all the trunks and leaves that surrounded Liam, so he kept them closed, focusing on everything that touched his other senses, instinctively sticking out his tongue to rely on whatever his breakthrough had taught it to perceive.
The world in Liam’s vision should be dark. His eyelids were shut in the end, but pictures appeared nonetheless.
Liam’s other senses caught everything, from sounds, humidity, vibrations, scents, and air pressure, creating an almost-perfect replica of the violent battle happening hundreds of meters away.
As predicted, Dominic didn’t go all-out against Lancelot. He didn’t even rely on actual techniques, be it due to arrogance, politics, or sheer confidence in his superior Qi’s capabilities of handling a rooting expert.
Yet, even when holding back, Dominic cornered Lancelot. One of the best rooting experts the Kingdom had to offer was still powerless to inflict anything meaningful on a cultivator from a superior stage.
But that changed when Lancelot unleashed the best aspects of his arsenal. He was bright. He was scorching. He was majestic in ways that rooting experts shouldn’t be, but even that only amounted to forcing the opponent he couldn’t hope to match to react properly.
However, Liam still saw that as his opportunity. When Lancelot unleashed his Burning Man, Liam felt a reaction in his very instincts coming from both his upbringing in Krosstoen’s mountain and what his breakthrough had given him.
Liam didn’t think. He just acted. He opened his eyes, but they gazed straight ahead, not pointing in the battle’s direction nor looking at anything in particular.
Meanwhile, Liam spread his arms, his left hand open and empty, his right one closed on the Black Bow.
’One to the Earth,’ Liam thought, saying the words he had read on the old tome, helping him enter a trance-like focus. All the Qi circulating through his body shuddered at the beginning of that ritual, waiting for it to continue.
And Liam continued. His arms went up, stretching above his head, his hands touching as he uttered more words in his mind. ’One to the Heavens.’
The Qi inside Liam’s body stopped circulating entirely. All of it left his meridians like a receding tide that had his left hand at its origin, causing a sense of weakness that threatened to make him falter.
Liam breathed deeply, suppressing the instinct of gritting his teeth to endure the debilitating feeling. His left hand had become stiff, overloaded with energy that pressed at it from within. It was bloated and on the verge of exploding, but his body could barely hold on.
Liam’s deep breaths gained a precise rhythm as he lowered his stiff hand, hooking his fingers on the bowstring, pulling it while lowering the weapon itself.
Everything was precise. It had to be. The pull and aiming had to happen simultaneously, or the rank 3 weapon art would fail.
Liam kept looking ahead despite pointing the Black Bow to his right. There was a trunk on the way, but that didn’t matter. The Sky-Splitting Bolt didn’t care for barriers or hindrances, and Liam didn’t need his eyes to fire that weapon.
The energy that had accumulated in Liam’s left hand started to come out in an orderly fashion. It gathered on the piece of string his fingers were pulling in the form of a dark sphere that radiated green hues.
The Black Bow shook as the sphere grew darker and darker, its light obscuring its surroundings. The shade cast by the crowns above deepened, removing any trace of color.
The tremors intensified. The muscles on Liam’s right arm tensed as he fought against the shaking. The bow’s metal frame groaned under the strain, but he knew it could endure it. He had already tested as much.
Eventually, a miniature dark sun condensed on the bowstring, held back by Liam’s fingers. His whole body wanted to shake at that point, struggling to contain that heavily dense energy. His abdomen tensed, his back muscles bloated, and blood vessels on his forehead popped and pulsated, but he remained perfectly still.
Liam took another deep breath, filling his lungs to maximum capacity, before exhaling forcefully, simultaneously releasing the bowstring.
The attack made no sound. It was so fast that its advance barely counted as traveling. The miniature dark sun transformed into a fist-sized trail that instantly scarred the world and what had once been in its place, be it trunks, low branches, air, or a branching expert’s heart.
