The woman in white conjured by Song Ting stood at the center of the Arena, her slender figure swaying like a willow in the wind.
Her plain white skirt stirred gently, and a smile that was not quite a smile curved her exquisitely beautiful face.
He raised a hand to tuck back a nonexistent stray lock of hair, curled his fingers into a delicate pose, and winked at Blood Baleful as he charged toward him.
Blood Baleful's door-sized greatsword had already arrived.
There was no real technique to that strike. He was simply smashing it down.
The blade was as broad as half a door and more than three inches thick, its dark red surface looking as though it had been soaked in dried blood. Dense scarlet Killing Intent coiled around it.
Countless tiny faces churned within the Killing Intent, each one a projection of the lingering resentment of a life Blood Baleful had slaughtered.
The greatsword tore through the air with a shriek like ten thousand ghosts wailing. Wherever its edge passed,
even space's self-repair mechanism was tainted by the Killing Intent, slowing its recovery more than tenfold.
The woman Song Ting had conjured tapped her toes against the ground and floated backward, her white skirt spreading behind her under the pull of momentum like a blooming white lotus.
Blood Baleful's greatsword struck the spot where she had stood, and the Arena floor rang with a deep hum like an ancient bronze bell.
A ring of crimson Killing Intent rippled outward from the point of impact in every direction.
It shook the chains of law throughout the area so violently that they briefly turned from gold to dark red.
"How frightening."
Song Ting's voice turned soft and coquettish, its rising lilt carrying a hint of deliberate reproach.
"A man