Chapter 590 Cute girl & Cute snake (part 4)
Esmeralda who witnessed the previous scene from both perspectives, since her real body was inside of Kana's dantian, while her copy was laying down on top of Aster's head, couldn't help but frown.
"I thought you were going to use that lizard to attack those two?", she asked to Aster who nodded in response.
"I am going to do it, but what would be the point of going after them openly, both of them have been in that situation already after all".
Curiously enough, those two were actually openly hunted down by the same people, the Tempest family, for Espi, they wanted to capture it since it was a rare dragon subspecies, even if it couldn't be contracted, its whole body could be used for a variety of purposes, which was probably the end of the sand wyrms that were captured back at Esmeralda's realm.
For Kana the history explained itself, the Tempest tried to sacrifice the ancestor of her lineage but the younger sister of the matriarch, who happened to be Sarina's ancestor not only frustrated their plans but cursed them, and since the Breezeheart family branch disappeared from the outer world, they have been looking for the descendants of Kana's ancestor, since they somehow got to know she didn't disappear along with the Breezeheart family.
In other words, both the little girl and the little snake have been in situations when people are openly coming after them, Espi is ultimately a spirit beast, its instincts will make it retaliate when its life is in danger, and Kana has been taught by Aster how to deal with enemies, kill them without an ounce of doubt.
However, the really troublesome enemies aren't those that come after you openly, but those that move in the shadows, after all, it's easier to dodge a spear at daylight than an arrow in the dark.
"I didn't think you'd be harsh with those two", mumbled Esmeralda after understanding more or less, what Aster was planning to do, which made the latter sigh.
"There is no better lesson that experiencing something firsthand, Kana kindness being a weakness is not her fault, it's the fault of this damn world which doesn't deserve her, and since that is the case, they'll get me instead", he said.
The little girl used to be practically incapable of harming others, she didn't bother anyone and was kind with all, but how was her kindness repaid, didn't Robert try to use her as disposable asset to raise in status, then there were the Tempest and their stupid idea of using her as a sacrifice as well, and the worst part is that there was no punishment for such injustice.
The one who interfered in both cases was Aster, if he didn't go to her native planet, chances are that Sarina would have died either due to corruption or trying to save Kana from Robert, while Kana's future would have been uncertain, but even if she escaped, the Tempest might have found her later on, the result would have been the same.
In fact, Aster has noticed that his participation had brought great impact to the lives of those that surround him, from Lilia to the most recent additions to the team, like Myra or Nim, and there is probably an explanation for that, but that's not important now.
What's important is that the heavens watched such a good girl being object of such injustices and did nothing, how could he stand such a thing.
"Mm?", Aster suddenly felt as if his blood was boiling, in fact that appeared to be the case, because the tree branch below him lit up despite it being green vegetation, he had to take a deep breath to calm down.
'This troublemaker dragon lineage of mine', thought Aster, he took a long exhalation in which he actually expulsed steam, which caught Esmeralda's attention.
"I wonder, are you learning how to use dragon flames, that is not supposed to be something an infant stage should be able to do, but one can never be sure when it comes to you…", she mumbled.
Aster chuckled in response as he shook his head.
"No, according to the manual I'm using, only Heavenly Realm dragonkin who have entered the elder stage can learn that, and there is no one like that in the Drage, even the Heavenly Conquerors of the family are at most early adult stage dragons while the old ancestor is a middle stage one".
Seeing Esmeralda nodding, Aster then added.
"That being said, mom, sis and me obtained the first trait at the infant stage regardless of our realms, since our bloodline is not diluted like theirs, so who knows what will happen when we reach the teen stage".
Aster already confirmed that the nature of Lilia, Alice and his lineage is fire oriented, they enjoying swimming in molten lava was the first hint, their scalding high inner temperatures during night activities when they get… excited, was the second hint.
All spirit beasts with a decent fire-oriented lineage have the opportunity to develop a beast flame, humans can obtain them too as long as they met certain requirements to refine a beast flame spark, like Mylene did, but humans who descend from fire-oriented spirit beasts don't need to go through that, if they reach a certain level, they'll obtain it as one of their lineage abilities.
The Might of the Dragon King manual mentions it, but it is only a myth among the Drage.
"You are all a bunch of monsters", jokingly said Esmeralda, before she focused on those two, which Aster did as well.
…
At the other side of the jungle, Kana and Espi were being guided by the green scaled lizard, they actually bypassed quite a few troublesome areas where there were small packs of spirit beasts resting or simply hiding for a prey to be surrounded by them, among them there wasn't a lack of Sea of Knowledge level beasts like the lizard, but they were smaller, which in this case meant they were weaker than the lizard.
So, they weren't targeted through a large part of the route in which the lizard made them follow, that was until they passed the middle area of the jungle, though the vegetation didn't change much, the pressure within the jungle increased quite a bit.
It is said that with enough exposition to spirit energy life will bloom, such is the case of spirit elements for example, so even unanimated objects have a chance to change their existence, so what will happen when vegetation which is already alive but uncapable of moving actively, is exposed to spirit energy.
A good example of the answer to the previous is none other than the chatterbox runic oak Nim, of course not all vegetation can jump all the way to gain personality and other human characteristics, but at the very least is normal for vegetation past the Sea of Knowledge to develop a certain sentience, which is what was surrounding those two right now, it felt as if the forest was alive.
"Mm, this feels different than the forest back at the alley, these trees don't seem friendly at all…", mumbled Kana.
That was one of the things Aster wanted Kana to realize, there is huge difference in spirit herbs cultivated by people and those that bloom in the wilderness, sure there are plants that don't mess with cultivators, but just as spirit herbs are nourishment for cultivators, the contrary is also true.
Of course, under normal circumstances things at the very least will go around Kana, without targeting her like it happens with Vivian's poisons, or be "friendly" with her, like what happens with the flowers and other spirit herbs at the garden made by Helena and Dahlia.
But Aster purposedly chose a place which is used to train the girls from the Green Lotus faction, that specialize in finding and collecting herbs, like Dahlia, in fact he got to know about this planet thanks to her.
This jungle was designed to be completely harmless on the outside but a deadly trap as one deepens into it, with vegetation that is practically hostile against anything that doesn't belong to this specific ecosystem.
"Hshghhh!", the green scaled lizard suddenly stopped moving and then turned to see Kana and Espi to make a strange sound, which the little snake then "translated" to Kana.
"This is the safest route to the innermost part of the forest, since the spirit beast that reigns over this passage is the weakest among the Genesis Manifestation overlords of the jungle", mumbled Kana.
She and Espi stared at each other and then used their spirit senses to confirm whether the lizard was lying or not, which made Aster who was observing the whole thing from afar, nod in an approbatory way.
After a few seconds both Kana and Espi realized that what the lizard said was true, the danger they felt coming from the other directions of the jungle was quite higher than the one in which they were supposed to advance through, if they followed the lizard, so they ultimately agreed to tag along.
The lizard even agreed to keep guiding them as long as they teamed up in case something happened, after all as a spirit beast the lizard could tell that Espi was of a much higher origin than itself, for spirit beasts their lineage is everything, those of a stronger race and a purer lineage are treated as nobles by other spirit beasts and Espi is a dragon subspecies.
Though spirit beasts that had yet to obtain wisdom, and even those that had obtained it, are too unlikely to know what a dragon is, meaning they also won't know how noble Espi's blood is, they will still feel the extraordinariness of the little snake.
That being said, Espi has always been smarter than other spirit recognized.
"Hiiisss!", the little snake quickly used its around three-meter-long beasts, as it learned to how camouflage itself to avoid those who hunted down the other sand wyrms back at Esmeralda's realm, under normal circumstances others wouldn't realize its race, but the lizard was being controlled by Aster so…
Kana and Espi who were advancing through the thick vegetation suddenly stopped, as their road was blocked by a giant tree on which a large "object" was resting, something that Espi easily recognized.
"Hiiisss!", the little snake quickly used its around three-meter-long body to surround Kana, as a way to protect her, from the thing that was now coming down the tree.
The thing was a fifty-meter-long dark green snake, a spirit beast called green wood boa, judging by its size and the pressure being radiated by it, it was a Genesis Manifestation level spirit beast.
"Hshhhhhhhhh!!!", the boa angrily hissed at the lizard to then switch its attention to the other two that had invaded its territory, and its eyes glowed with a cold light, there was an obviously recent wound on a side of its body as the trail of blood that could be seen on the trunk of the tree, suggested.
As Kana was about to ask Espi to talk with the boa so it didn't attack them, the little snake shook its head and then hissed a couple of times to explain that the boa wanted to eat them to recover its wound.
The Lizard surprisingly moved and stood next to Kana to state its position in the conflict, which only infuriated the boa, apparently the lizard was part of the subordinates of the boa, spirit beasts have "Clang!", the arrows collided against the whip-like tail of the large boa and produced a sound of metal clashing against metal, the clash lasted for a couple of seconds, but ultimately how could the little a clear hierarchy among them, for those that hadn't gained wisdom, the one with the bigger fist is the king.
For those that had gained wisdom, it varies, most of the time the common lineages serve the noble ones, but it's not all the time based on respect but fear, because those from higher ranked races have the ability to suppress lower ranked races to a certain extent.
In case you wonder why the boa wasn't calling its other subordinates, it's because it is wounded, if they decide to join the lizard to kill it, then it will be the end of the boa, so instead it decided to fight the three by itself.
"Hshhhhhh!", the boa let out a loud sound as its pressure exploded all over the place, the faint traces of other spirit beasts approaching the area out of curiosity, disappeared on the spot, the boa is still an overlord level in this jungle so when they felt its obviously angered battle cry they ran away.
"It's coming!", with a quick warn, Kana's legs were surrounded by wind as she jumped to the right to dodge the boa which was rushing towards them, while Espi flew to the left and the lizard went underground.
"Booom!", the boa used its strong body as a weapon, something common among spirit beasts that hadn't gained wisdom, the impact created a loud sound as a couple of trees were broke in half like twigs and fell causing a curtain of dust to raise.
Having avoided the body slam of the boa, Kana took out her bow and shot a couple of arrows aiming at the eyes of the boa, the little girl has been taught by Aster how to deal with humans and later on Esmeralda had taught her how to fight with spirit beasts and other non-human enemies, reducing the visibility and mobility was a good way to deal with large enemies.
Unfortunately, the boa was actually quite cunning, as it used its tail which's scales were tougher than those of its head to block the arrows shot by the little girl.
girl produce more momentum than the snake, when she isn't a body cultivator nor has a lineage that focuses on physical strength.
Of course, there is a solution to every problem, the little girl beat the crap out of Ley back at Esmeralda's realm, but that was using the daily chance she had of using one of Esmeralda's elements, in that case she used the green jade element, and to do that not only she had use Esmeralda's wind to become the "older Kana", but using an element which wasn't wind in that form will wear her out, back then that sole punch used up all her spirit energy reserves, now she should be able to last longer but that was the last resort that Esmeralda taught her.
The real name of that state was Element Synchronization and it was both the strongest and most basic ability that someone who had made a contract with a spirit element obtained, the most basic because it was obtained the moment the contract was formalized, the strongest because with time as the synchronization advanced, the boost that the contractor will be able to obtain will also increase.
And in Esmeralda's particular case, said boost not only applied to wind, but to the other elements she has integrated into her existence, that meant that in that form Kana became way stronger than what an average contractor would be under the same circumstances, but the toll on her was also bigger.
"Hisss!", Espi flew towards Kana and the little girl jumped on top of it, the little snake could tell what Kana was thinking, but before going to such drastic lengths they still had a couple of options they could try, for example a movement they have been practicing together.
Espi's scales shone in a pretty soft lavender light, before mist of the same color was radiated by them, the next thing that the boa knew was that a dozen of exact copies of the little snake and the little girl standing on top of it, appeared floating on the air.
"Hshhhhhh!", the boa's eyes saw red, it was already angered and the enemy was playing tricks, of course it was furious, but that was the idea, the mist element that Espi obtained had illusion and confusing type properties, it was a mental attack to a certain extent, though its purpose was mostly to trick the enemy, the copies will look "taunting" as well, of course earlier Espi didn't use that against Aster as it only wanted to show its skill to Aster to get some praises from him.
But with the enemy things were different, the twelve sets of Kana and Espi started moving all over the area surrounding the boa, who was having troubles to follow what was happening, it knew that there was no way the enemies just multiplied but it still couldn't tell which one was the real enemy, heck, Espi managed to trick Aster, so a mere spirit beast that has yet to obtain wisdom of this level stood no chance.
On the other hand, Kana who was riding on top of Espi could tell that this ability used a lot of the spirit energy of the little snake, to work on stronger enemies, so she didn't waste time, taking a deep
breath, Kana's body overflowed with wind spirit energy, which was then infused on her bow and arrow.
The boa felt a sensation of danger but couldn't pinpoint from which "Kana" it came, so it didn't know which one it should focus on, which ultimately led to it coiling around itself in a try to protect its weak points, which included its head and the wound on one of its sides, all this while its tail was still trying to knock Kana down of Espi's back, which forced those two to maneuver on the air.
Kana let go of the string and an arrow with a small scale whirlwind rotating around it was shot from twelve different directions, the boa tried to sweep them all with its tail, but the ones it managed to "destroy" were all fakes.
"Booom!", the real arrow impacted near the side of the boa which had the wound on it, and caused a large number of scales to be peeled out from the boa's body, making the latter retort in pain, the arrow shot by Kana left a small crater on its body from which blood came out.
"Hshhhhhh!", the boa hissed in pain, wind has a really nice piercing property and while Kana is weaker than the boa, with the proper amount of spirit energy infused into the arrow, the attack will still hurt quite a bit.
Kana immediately charged another attack and with Espi's cooperation, they managed to land it on the boa once again, after the fourth arrow, the boa realized that its defense strategy wasn't working, so it changed to a full offensive mode, the green scales of the boa shone in a dark green light, though the major wound on its side rejected the wood mana that was trying to close it, the other wounds which were caused by Kana were covered in a layer of wood to recover the next second.
"Hisss", Espi hissed at Kana whose pretty eyes glowed in response, she followed the same strategy, though this time the boa became way more aggressive, it was to the point that it increased its speed which was understandable, the boa was stimulating its vitality using its wood element, it was a temporary boosting, similar to using yang radiance, meaning the boa will end up tired after using it.
"Watch out", Kana saw the boa suddenly accelerating and she shouted but they were a second late and the boa managed to swallow them both with its large snout filled with spiked teeth.
Unfortunately for the boa, what it swallowed was just a large amount of lavender colored mist, which was released in its mouth making it feel dizzy for a second, a second that the little girl and the little snake didn't let go to waste.
"Now!", with Kana giving the green light, Espi slightly opened its mouth and softly blew, producing a smooth looking green-yellow flame which was added to the whirlwind that Kana had created around her arrow.
That was one of the abilities of the second material that Espi integrated into its body during its advance, they were yang flames that originated on the piece of the branch from Nim which was the most radiated by yang energy through the years, Espi couldn't obtain the ability of the runic oak to increase the efficiency of runes engraved on it, since Nim couldn't give wood with that ability without harming itself, what could freely give away were pieces of its bark, which could be used to create talismans with one of the better efficiency increasing capacities among the materials that existed even in the Divine Firmaments.
But that wouldn't have any effect on Espi, so instead he asked the runic oak to give him one of branches from its clone, which was the most radiated by yang energy, Nim easily agreed to after "tricking" Aster into answering a lot of questions regarding human customs, and that piece of yang radiated wood was then purified using Rigel's flames and given to Espi for its advance.
The result, Espi obtaining wood element with yang flame properties, and a curious thing about fire element, it goes extremely well with both wind and wood, so while Espi couldn't use wood to attack but to heal as it was vitality related, so it just added the flames to Kana's attack, Kana had both wind and "nature" attribute, one thanks to her lineage and one with which she was born with originally.
Curiously enough she was born with nature attribute but it wasn't "official" until she made her contract with Esmeralda, which was also the moment she resonated with one of the stars in the mind space, prior to that she couldn't use nature attribute spirit energy but that's what helped her with her hobby of planting flowers around Sarina's mansion, she instead was able to use wind, but didn't train on it, since Sarina who was supposed to be her teacher was bedridden not too long after she turned five years old when she got her wind attribute.
"Hshrghhh!", the lizard which has been hiding underground suddenly yelled at Espi, who then hissed to Kana, the lizard jumped out from where it was hiding and used its body to tackle the boa.
According to what Espi just said, it accelerated as much as it could becoming a lavender flash of light, the eleven of them which were remaining did at the same time, not giving the boa the time to look for the real one, while the lizard held it down, with its wounded side open for an attack.
Naturally the boa didn't just stay there and used its tail to slap the lizard, which gritted its teeth and reinforced its body as much as it could, though the sound of bones breaking could still be heard coming from it.
Kana softly bit her lip, her attack finished charging and she let go of the string of her bow, releasing a green beam of light, caused by the combination of the three elements infused on the arrow.
"Hshhhhhhhh!", the boa screamed in pain as the green beam opened a five-meter hole in its body starting from the side which was already wounded, but that wasn't all, green-yellow flames exploded on the wound burning the wood spirit energy of the boa, making it lit up in flames which ultimately caused the death of the boa.
"Booom!", the large spirit beast collapsed on the ground, with smoke coming out of its nose and mouth, the lizard which jumped when the arrow impacted the boa, was laying down with blood coming out of its mouth, the previous whip attacks of the boa had caused inner damage to it.
Espi landed on the ground to take well-deserved rest, Kana immediately jumped out of the little snake and sat down next to it, she was gasping for air, since that attack used a fourth part of her spirit energy reserves in a single go, she wasn't a monster like Aster who even if used all his spirit energy, he had his soul energy and even then his body would not give in due to his high vitality which translated in a high stamina that was akin to body cultivators.
But Kana didn't just sit down to rest, she took out a pill from her spatial ring and threw it to the lizard without a second of hesitation, only to hear the lizard making some sounds.
"Hrshshh!", Espi heard it and hissed at Kana, the lizard was basically asking for permission to consume the meat and core of the boa.
The Boa was actually quite wounded, since it had lost in a territorial fight against one of the other overlords, because though a beast without wisdom doesn't have the ability to manifest its Genesis Core, like cultivators do, its strength would have been at least 50% higher than what Kana and Espi experienced right now, the mobility of the boa was severely affected and it lost its cool too easily as well, since its life was in danger from the very beginning.
Which is why it didn't even consider letting Kana and Espi go, it saw them as easy prey to turn into nourishment to recover, which ended up being its downfall.
"Sure, I don't think the meat of a spirit beast which was wounded would taste good, not to mention a certain someone burnt it anyway", cutely said Kana, which made Espi hiss to complain.
"Hisss!", the lizard swallowed the pill that it was given and then slowly approached the boa to carve into its body, a not so appreciable sight for the little girl, who leaned down on Espi to rest a bit, while the lizard devoured the meat and core of the boa.
A few seconds later a large amount of spirit energy gathered around the corpse of the boa, from which the lizard came out as its body grew to be around thirty meters large, it just advanced to the Genesis Manifestation realm, the growth stopped there but the lizard still devoured what was left of the boa in a matter of seconds.
"Mm?", Kana suddenly noticed that other spirit beasts were rushing this way, so she stood, Espi did the same but as they were about to tell the lizard which was still in a doze due to its advance, they were hit by a wave of spirit energy radiated by the lizard.
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