Chapter 595 A treasure’s allure (part 3)
The scenery in front of Aster's eyes changed from the resting area in that temporary city, to an open area at the top of a platform that was floating above in the sky, Aster looked downwards but the everything below the platform was covered by clouds.
Mikaela and the elders didn't enter with them, there was a barrier covering the platform and a message was displayed on it.
Basically, it explained that the name of this event was "Treasure Hunt" and that it was prohibited to use any kind of spirit treasure besides the ones that could be found here, spatial rings included.
Besides that, it listed the classic rules for events in the sect, which basically prohibited killing, but fighting was allowed, as for the objective of the event, it didn't say anything besides "Reach the exit" and that they could keep the treasures they managed to take with them to the exit.
Next to the message there was a countdown which reached zero on the spot, the barrier around the platform disappeared, which the participants took as the greenlight to start the fight.
"Boooom!", naturally the vast majority had the same idea "eliminate as much competition as possible", so with an explosion caused by spirit energy clashing and a shockwave provoked by body cultivators exchanging blows, the treasure hunt started.
Aster ignored the turmoil and approached one of the corners of the platform, his actions didn't escape the eyes of the ones that wanted to eliminate him from the event, however no one wanted to take the first step either.
"What are you waiting for, he is alone!", shouted a deacon from the Red Sword faction to the group of the Purple Lotus faction, but before the two sides decided on how to group against Aster and Camila, a few high-pitched whistling sounds drew the attention of all the participants.
'Mom, what kind of girls did you become friends with…', thought Aster just to hear Lilia's giggles from the mind space.
The clouds that surrounded the platform were suddenly blown away by a group of streams of light, at least that's what they looked from afar but once they got closer, the participants realized they were actually a bunch of different spirit treasures.
Judging by the aura those treasures were radiating, they were all low-grade Stellar spirit treasures, whose forms caried, swords, spears, shields, axes, arrows, chains and the list goes on.
The eyes of a large part of the participants shone with greed, those weapons were perfect for them and judging by their auras, those were high quality treasures, what's more they were coming their way.
As expected, the people rushed towards the side of the platform where the flock of spirit treasures were arriving, almost all the participants did so, Aster on the other hand grabbed Camila's hand.
"Time's up", he said as he humped out of the platform, they both disappeared into the white clouds that were below the platform, which made the few girls from the Black Sword and Green Lotus factions to hesitate for a moment, as they saw the treasures were about to reach the platform, but ultimately, they chose to follow their instincts and jumped from the platform, just like Aster did.
There was a small group besides those two, who also after a moment of consideration jumped out of the platform, which belonged to the Yellow Anvil faction, in other words they were the opposition faction of the Blacksmith Peak, whose core elder was Riley.
Naturally, the previous was seen by the ones who stayed behind, who coldly snorted with disdain.
"Stupid bitches, are they really that desperate to get into the good books of that idiot, that they chose to waste such a good opportunity, oh well, more for us", said one of the girls on the Red Sword faction's group.
"Senior sister, shouldn't we leave too, the Lord of the Twin Sword valley is known for being a talented Spirit Blacksmith and he didn't hesitate to leave, the group from the Yellow Anvil left as well?", asked a young girl from the Brown Anvil faction's group, to an older looking disciple, who shook her head in response.
"The vast majority thinks that guy is a talented blacksmith because his sword broke Edward's creations with relative ease, however, the disciples of the Light Blue Anvil focus on battle, they cultivate using manuals that doesn't require them to forge to advance".
"Those crazy women from the Yellow Anvil go half and half, the have to forge and fight, which is why their disciples have to find a companion to do the part they leave for later, we on the other hand focus all of our time to blacksmithing and only need to do that in order to become stronger, the only reason as to why we don't have a senior sister in the top ten is because we despise wasting time in things non related to blacksmithing", exclaimed that girl.
The top ten was indeed decided mostly by battle prowess, it wasn't directly done, but the missions that gave the highest merit points for disciples, were most of the time related to fighting.
It's normal though, treasure stores, auction houses and other merchants won't commission members of the youngest generation to create products for them, there were some missions to assist master blacksmiths though, but they were quite rare and fought over, since once someone was chosen by the blacksmith in question, another spot won't open anytime soon.
Hence why the members of factions that didn't focus on battle skills, were at most on the top twenty or thirty.
Just as the older girl finished her explanation, the group of treasures arrived at the platform and all the participants went crazy, up-close they realized that those treasures were even better than what they expected.
"Get the hell out of my way!".
"Those treasures are mine!".
The battle for the ownership of those treasures immediately started, the larger groups bombarded the smaller ones with attacks, knocking them out of the platform, flying was banned in this place, so while some wind attributed cultivators could glide and even float for short periods of time if they knew telekinesis, it was really hard to get back on the platform.
There was around a hundred participants in total, the group from each faction went from 10 to 15 members, the groups of the Green Lotus and Black Sword factions were on the smaller side, for a total of twenty girls who all left after Aster did, the same applied to the group from the Yellow Anvil.
So that left around 60 something participants left on the platform, and more than half of them were from the Red Sword, Purple Lotus and Brown Anvil factions, so it was easy for them to suppress the other participants and while they couldn't eliminate them, forcing them out of the platform wasn't that hard.
The three groups saw the weapons coming towards them and they moved towards one of the treasures each, there were more than enough for them, so each one of the managed to obtain at least one, while some treasures flew past them into the clouds below the platform.
"What an amazing craftwork, this is close to the level that custom created treasures are!", exclaimed one of the girls from the Red Sword faction who was holding a spear.
The others nodded in agreement as they inspected their earnings.
Below the clouds Aster who was falling from the sky with Camila holding onto him, suddenly looked upwards and then smirked.
"It should be starting now", he said, Camila softly giggled, she knew why Aster took her and jumped out of the platform.
Speaking of the platform, the horror started with a loud pained scream.
"Aghhh!", one of the members of the Red Sword faction was forced to let go of the weapon he was holding, because the thing grew spikes in its handle and practically turned the hand of the one who was holding it, into a bloody mess.
As if it was some kind of signal, similar screams, curses and wails started to be heard from all over the platform, as the different spirit treasures started attacking their supposed owners.
"What the hell are these!!!", shouted that older girl from the Brown Anvil faction as she threw the hammer she had gotten earlier, just to be forced to jump down the platform since the hammer was chasing after her with the intention of breaking the hand with which she held it.
…
While those guys were fleeing from those treasures as if their lives depended on it, Aster extended his free hand where an incomplete black sword appeared, in case you wonder why he took out a weapon that doesn't originate from this place, when it's against the rules, that's because what he is holding isn't a broken spirit treasure but the black sword soul weapon, he created through the Soul Crushing Parade.
"Aster", Camila who was about to take out her natal weapon, just to realize that would be against the rules, turned around to to warn him, which earned her a calm smile from Aster.
"I know", he limited to say, to then swing the incomplete black sword soul weapon at his right, from which an arrow came by piercing the clouds.
There was no impact nor sound from the clash between the incomplete black sword and the arrow, but the result was clear, the arrow lost its shine and impulse and then fell from the sky, disappearing into the distance a second later.
Camila's pretty light blue eyes shone in a copper metallic light, as she pointed upwards.
"They are coming!".
Aster inwardly chuckled, he moved Camila so that she was now hanging from his neck while hugging him from behind, with his other hand free now, Aster casually caught a spear that was coming at him from the right, while he slashed down an axe with his soul weapon on the left.
"I can understand failing to engrave a few dozens of treasures, but creating "cursed weapons" on purpose and on this scale, that godmother of mine surely has a strange hobby", said Aster as he saw the sparks flying coming out from the point of contact between his hand and the spear as the thing tried to harm him, but was stopped by the paragon body.
Aster casually slashed the spear with the black sword soul weapon, and the thing stopped trying to harm him, which would have been a happy occurrence, if it wasn't for the fact that the runes and arrays engraved on the spear not only disappeared but the raw weapon dropped its quality a lot, which was made on purpose.
'Heh, so we can't obtain the treasures by destroying these aggressive weapon spirits, as expected of my dear godmothers', thought Aster.
That's right, all these weapons were imbued with a flawed weapon spirit, creating a sentient weapon is a technique that has been lost in the four heavenly quadrants, as of current, through generations of experimenting, blacksmiths and rune masters have been able to recreate it, but their limit is set to peak sky grade weapon spirits.
Whish on paper is a weapon spirit apt for treasures below the Transcending realms, however, to create a sentient weapon a weapon spirit and a spirit treasure of equal grade are needed.
That being said, a lower ranked weapon spirit can be imbued into a higher ranked weapon, the result won't be a sentient weapon though, but what is called a "cursed weapon", which is basically a spirit treasure with a weapon spirit that can't properly work in the vessel it was imbued into, resulting in errors at the moment of executing the instructions it was programmed to.
They are called cursed weapons, because the primary instruction that each and every weapon spirit has is "protect", with the current technique developed in the four galaxies, the command "protect" has to be put for the weapon spirit to be created, regardless of grade.
When the weapon spirit is flawed, the command "protect" is nullified and twisted, so that the spirit treasure will instead attack its owner, those are cursed weapons.
And then, the one who created all these weapon spirits, added runes to the physical vessels so that they would resonate with those that had good compatibility with them, in other words, these treasures would actively seek to harm those that under normal circumstances would have been able to fully exploit their potential.
As for why those treasures stopped chasing after Aster slashed them down with the incomplete black sword soul weapon, the sword was destroying their weapon spirits, Aster did it like this since if he used his soul energy imbued with annihilation properties, he would end up destroying the formations of the treasures, but the incomplete soul weapon only affected the weapon spirits.
After a few minutes of descending from the sky and Aster constantly destroying a plethora of spirit treasures that tried to attack them, they finally left the area covered by clouds, to be able to see what the landscape below of them looked like.
What waited for Aster and Camila was a completely open area with a giant entrance and stairs that led underground, that's the only thing that could be seen as the flat ground extended as far as the eye could reach but there was no exit.
Aster used telekinesis to slow down their fall and then landed without any problem, only then Camila let go of Aster, it was easy for Aster to tell she was feeling guilty for all the treasures that came after them.
Aster is a swordsman, so normally only sword type spirit treasures would have chased after him, and while there was a large amount of them trying to cut him down, there was an even larger number of varied treasures that chased them.
And that could only be attributed to Camila's lineage ability to attract treasures, it was food enough that not all the treasures came after them, it was the proof that she has progressed in learning how to control her lineage, unfortunately it's not something that could be just turned off, her proximity to Aster as well as she having obtained her natal treasure, helped but in this kind of situation she was at disadvantage as those treasures will notice her aura.
However, Aster counted with it, in fact that's why he brought her here for their date, she couldn't even use the sweater he gifted her, as it counted as a spirit treasure.
"What's up with that face, are you really that sad to not be able to hold onto me like before?", jokingly said Aster, which made Camila softly smile.
"Sorry, I don't think I'll be of much help here, those cursed weapons absorbed spirit energy and my soul cultivation is too low to condense a it like Felicia does", she said with an apologetic voice.
Spirit energy had a negative effect in their situation, her soul cultivation was too low for the job and her lineage related abilities would only worsen the situation, or at least that's what she thought.
Aster once again summoned the incomplete black sword soul weapon, the little thing twirled around Aster as if it was trying to show its excitement over being in the outside world again.
Aster's pupils changed to vertical ones, he looked at the sword closely and couldn't help but smile.
"I gained a different perspective when I obtained these eyes, thanks to them I can now help my family improve in ways I wouldn't even have imagined before, for example turns out that destroying those weapon spirits accelerates the condensation of my soul weapon, so in my eyes, you attracting a lot of those cursed weapons is a great fortune, expected from my family exclusive lady luck".
Aster saw Camila's face blushing and he chuckled as he walked towards the stairs that led underground, to then add.
"Use your aura, you can defend against those things and I get to slash them down, it's a win-win situation, if you get to destroy more than me, I'll give you a little reward", he playfully said as he jumped into the opening that led underground.
Camila's eyes sparkled, she mumbled a couple of things and then rushed after Aster, this day will be remembered in the future, since it will mark the revival of a bloodline whose name used to be spread all over the vast galaxies.
But for now, the moment Camila deepened into the stairs she found herself surrounded by around ten cursed weapons that were aiming at her, with a soft snort, her hands were cladded in a copper
metallic colored mist.
It was as if those treasures were injected with adrenaline, their attacks became fiercer, but they only accelerated their destruction.
"Crack!", with those little fists of hers, Camila punched the spirit treasures and made them explode with a single attack, she might not be a body cultivator, but her Treasure Aura allowed Camila's body to be as strong as a spirit treasure, and she has refined tons of the swords Aster created, among other high ranked materials and minerals that he had given her.
So, when using treasure aura, her physical defense was absurd to say the least, the downside is that she had to burn those drops of metallic liquid which were stored in her dantian, to use it.
Now Aster knows that strong auras sometimes require a source of energy, for example dragon aura used physical energy, though he could burn murder aura instead, the exchange ratio was quite bad.
In Camila's case, she needed to burn that liquid, which costed her to refine quite a few things to get some drops, but she also discovered that treasures that contained Aster's blood, produced a lot of drops of the improved version of the copper liquid, which was the silver one.
Not only the silver liquid lasted longer, but it regenerated, so right now Camila could use her aura to the content of her heart, and her reserves will refill with some rest.
Aster who was slashing down treasures right and left, saw Camila having fun destroying things and he inwardly laughed, his eyes then glowed as he gazed at her back.
'I should have known it, the effect of awakening a lineage isn't as simple as an increase in cultivation', he thought.
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