Advancement

Sand? There was no sand to begin with. It was all the result of Wien's harvesting.

As usual, Wien brought Jekain and Nel along to harvest the Gillians in Pairomon's territory.

After more than a year of building up his strength in the Forest of Menos, Wien was now on the verge of reaching the Mid Rank of Pseudo-Adjuchas. It wasn't that he had devoured too little, but that his Spiritual Power Compression was simply too aggressive. In fact, even against Nel, who had already entered Mid Rank, Wien's combat strength was in no way inferior to hers. After all, Wien ultimately wanted more than just the resources of this one territory.

"My king, three Pseudo-Adjuchas are approaching rapidly," Jekain, who was maintaining the spatial blockade, suddenly reported to Wien inside the barrier.

"Heh, they reacted much more slowly than I expected. That's a good thing." Inside the barrier, Wien swung his sword and killed a Gillian. Nel also leaped up and tore off a Gillian's mask, while several Pseudo-Adjuchas under Wien quickly divided up the remaining corpse.

"Keep hunting. Nel, come outside with me and take a look."

"Yes, my lord." Nel quickly swallowed the mask in her mouth and accompanied Wien out of the barrier. The Pseudo-Adjuchas all bowed and knelt on one knee, rising to resume their hunt only after Wien had left.

"My king, what should we do?"

"Are you sure there are only three?"

"Yes. There are no signs of any other Spiritual Pressure nearby."

"Then let's eat them."

"Do you need me to change the barrier?" Jekain asked. If he used the barrier to trap the three Pseudo-Adjuchas, the dozens of Gillians not yet harvested at the scene would likely leak traces of Spiritual Pressure, allowing the three approaching Pseudo-Adjuchas to sense them.

"No need. Just have the ones inside keep hunting. You stay here and act as bait. If you're in danger, find a subordinate to help you release Negación. Nel and I will deal with them."

"Yes." Jekain never doubted Wien's orders. Since Wien said he could handle them, he would certainly not fail. All Jekain had to do was trust him completely.

With that, Wien vanished strangely before Jekain's eyes.

He hadn't left using Sonído. Rather, Wien had combined his Concealment and spatial abilities with Sonído to create a new movement technique, which he named Void Flash.

First, he used Concealment to hide himself, then opened a spatial barrier and appeared at the other end of the barrier's anchor point with Sonído. This was somewhat faster than ordinary Sonído.

The fastest known Sonído was said to be capable of leaving five visual afterimages. If Wien put aside his Concealment and relied on the spatial barrier and Sonído alone, he could already create one afterimage. As his abilities and Spiritual Power improved, he would very likely reach or even surpass the limit of five afterimages.

Meanwhile, Nel trotted away from Jekain's location, found a sufficiently tall Canopy Tree, and hid herself. When the time came, as long as Wien sprang from the shadows, Nel was confident she could block the enemy's movements.

After all, aside from Wien, Nel's Sonído combined with Super Acceleration made her the fastest Hollow Wien currently knew.

Having concealed themselves and restrained their Spiritual Pressure, Wien and Nel waited for their prey to come to them.

In less than two hours, the three Pseudo-Adjuchas Menos Grandes encountered Jekain.

"Yinfeng? Why are you here? What are you doing?!" The Pseudo-Adjuchas who seemed to be leading the newcomers stepped forward and demanded an answer.

"What am I doing? Can't you tell?" The corners of Jekain's mouth curled in a cold sneer beneath his mask.

"A spatial blockade? What are you sealing off with your ability? Are you responsible for the Gillians that have suddenly disappeared from my lord's territory lately?!"

"You already know the answer, so why ask? Do you want me to open the barrier and show you?"

"Do you have any idea what you're doing?! Defying my lord's authority and plundering the Gillians in his territory as you please—are you trying to start a war?!"

"Pairomon and I were never in the same faction, so how could I be starting a war? We were enemies to begin with. Isn't it a little childish of you to say all this to me?"

"You!" The visiting Pseudo-Adjuchas felt that his lord's authority had been challenged. He instantly unleashed his Spiritual Pressure.

His Spiritual Pressure rising abruptly, the leading Hollow spoke to a small, slender humanoid Hollow behind him. "Go back and report to the lord. We'll hold them off." A glance at the small Hollow's build was enough to tell he was a Hollow Beast who excelled in speed.

The small Pseudo-Adjuchas nodded, turned around, and used Sonído to head back the way they had come.

Unfortunately, Wien was already concealed along his route. The instant the small Pseudo-Adjuchas emerged from Sonído, Wien used Void Flash to reach his back.

Wien's Spiritual Pressure erupted, shaking the small Pseudo-Adjuchas and causing even the Spiritual Pressure beneath his feet from Sonído to become somewhat unstable.

The Rift-Splitting Greatsword in Wien's left hand went straight for his head. With the advantage of surprise, Wien decapitated the small, Low Rank Adjuchas in a single strike.

Killing an Initial Pseudo-Adjuchas in one blow showed that Wien's strength was far beyond what his own Low Rank rank suggested.

"This..." Seeing their companion decapitated in one strike and sensing the sudden surge of Spiritual Pressure just now, the two remaining Pseudo-Adjuchas knew they had run into someone they couldn't handle.

"What a terrifying Concealment ability. Yinfeng, the one responsible for repeatedly assassinating the various lords and Pseudo-Adjuchas back then and stirring up conflict among the lords must have been one of yours, wasn't it?"

At this point, the two Pseudo-Adjuchas had figured it out. With such an accomplished Concealment technique, it would be absurd if they hadn't been behind the assassinations back then.

"You're not completely stupid. Unfortunately, you figured it out too late." As Jekain finished speaking, he fired a Cero at the two Pseudo-Adjuchas.

The two Hollows, being Pseudo-Adjuchas themselves and already on guard, moved out of the way the moment Jekain fired his Cero. But by dodging, they gave Wien another chance to attack.

Wien swung the longsword in his hand. A spatial rift opened instantly beside one of the Pseudo-Adjuchas, and a sword beam wrapped in Spiritual Pressure shot through it and struck him directly.

Dimensional Slash, a variation of Space-Splitting Slash. It used Rift-Splitting to unleash a sword beam of Spiritual Pressure, then sent the beam through a spatial rift to strike the enemy directly.

For a Low Rank Adjuchas, such an attack was nearly impossible to evade, and he took the blow head-on. Though he had tried to dodge, he had only managed to move his vital points out of the way.

"Oh?" Wien was slightly surprised. It seemed Dimensional Slash still needed further development, since it had actually given the enemy a chance to dodge. He had launched that attack intending to kill the enemy instantly. Without that dodge, the slash should have taken his head off at the neck, rather than severing one arm as it had.

"That's... a spatial ability!" The Low Rank Pseudo-Adjuchas had also identified the nature of Wien's ability. But it was already too late. Having lost an arm, his combat strength had fallen sharply, and escape was all but impossible.

"Go! Report what happened here to the lord!" the wounded Hollow Beast shouted to his companion while charging at Wien.

Wien ignored the fleeing Hollow Beast. He simply parried the attacker's strike with his greatsword and sent him flying with a kick.

Immediately afterward, Wien launched another Dimensional Slash, placing the sword beam in the path of the flying Hollow Beast. The wound over the Hollow Beast's heart became a cross, and scarlet blood instantly stained the ground beneath him red.

"Any last words?" Wien flourished his sword and put away the Spiritual Power greatsword, Rift-Splitting. Then he walked toward the Hollow Beast one step at a time.

"Hmph, don't think your plan will remain hidden. My lord will surely—"

Hum!!!

Before the Hollow Beast could finish, Wien fired a Concealment Cero straight into the sword wound over his heart. The Pseudo-Adjuchas Hollow Beast instantly lost his life.

"Sorry, I'm not in the mood to hear you out." After briefly testing the extent of Concealment Cero, Wien went over to the Hollow Beast, raised his right claw, and cut off the head he had failed to sever earlier. He stripped off his mask and finally stuffed it into his mouth.

Meanwhile, at the edge of the Forest, a surge of pink Spiritual Pressure soared into the sky. In less than five minutes, Nel returned to Wien with a mask in her mouth. It belonged to the Pseudo-Adjuchas Menos Grande who had just fled.

From the beginning of the battle to its end, Wien and the others had taken less than ten minutes to kill all three invading Pseudo-Adjuchas. It was a glimpse of the strength of Wien's team.

"As expected of a Pseudo-Adjuchas's Spiritual Pressure. It increases our Spiritual Power much faster than hunting Gillians." After eating the mask Nel had brought him, the Spiritual Power around Wien began to circulate rapidly. The Reishi in the surroundings was also stirred by the Spiritual Pressure he released and began to swirl constantly around him.

This was a sign of advancement. The same thing had happened when Nel advanced to Mid Rank, except that the Spiritual Pressure she had released then was pink, while Wien's was pale gold.

Seeing this, Jekain lifted his Spiritual Pressure blockade. The Pseudo-Adjuchas hunting Gillians inside were also drawn by the removal of the spatial blockade.

When they saw what was happening around Wien, they understood and quickened the pace of their harvesting, tossing Gillian masks one after another to his side.

Once the masks entered the area around Wien, they broke apart and churned along with the Reishi storm. As more masks arrived, the Reishi storm around Wien grew increasingly fierce.

After a long while, the Reishi swirling around him began to turn into pale gold light and converge on his body, finally drawing slowly inward and settling into stillness within him.

When it was all over, the force of Wien's Spiritual Pressure rose sharply. If Wien were to fight the three Pseudo-Adjuchas in his current state, he could likely have severely injured all three of them at once with a single strike.

"Congratulations, Lord Wien! You've finally advanced to Mid Rank!" Nel clapped excitedly. After spending some time together, Nel's feelers, which she used to throw Lanzador Verde, had finally found another use. Of course, given Nel's intelligence, she could do more than that.

"Congratulations on your advancement, my king." The dozens of Adjuchas under him all knelt before Wien at once.

Over the past year, they had also learned who the true master of this territory was.

With the help of the Spiritual Power in the three Pseudo-Adjuchas masks, Wien had officially stepped from the peak of Low Rank into Mid Rank.

However, after entering Mid Rank, Wien had not gained any new traits or innate abilities.

After becoming Adjuchas, every Hollow's abilities were fixed. All that remained was to develop and create using their abilities and talents. Perhaps this was why the intelligence of all Hollows began to develop after they reached the Pseudo-Adjuchas level.

"My king, barring any surprises, Pairomon already knows where we are. Are we going to face him head-on?"

Jekain stepped forward to ask. At this point, Wien and the others' Spiritual Pressure had already been exposed in Pairomon's territory. The Hollows with strong sensing abilities in his territory could presumably already detect the eruption of Spiritual Pressure just now.

"Have all the Pseudo-Adjuchas remain in their respective territories to hunt on their own, and help the Gillians who are conscious and can be of use to us advance. Bring the Hollow with the strongest sensing ability under your command and follow Nel and me. The four of us will be enough." Wien issued his orders directly.

"A head-on fight might be tiring, so we'll use guerrilla tactics. Four people are much more flexible in their movements. In the worst case, if we can't win, we can enter the Garganta and hide for a while."

"Yes, my king."