The Chiyan River gradually quieted beneath the torrential rain. Only the rain shelters along both banks, blown askew by the gale, and the broken torches scattered across the ground still bore traces of the brutal Saint Realm duel.
Under the direction of the imperial city guards, the millions in the crowd dispersed toward every part of the imperial capital like an ebbing flood. Yet the discussions spreading among them raged even more fiercely than the thunderstorm overhead.
Olivier was gravely wounded and dying. Haydson remained undefeated!
Even more alarming, after severely wounding Olivier, Rock Sword Saint Hederson had challenged Linley, the genius Dragonblood Warrior barely in his twenties, before a million spectators!
Three months later, on August 4, at the summit of Tujiao Mountain!
Late at night, at Earl Wharton's manor on Fushi Road.
The rear courtyard's reception room was brightly lit, but the atmosphere was almost oppressively heavy.
Bang!
Gates slammed his palm onto the red sandalwood table, his bell-sized eyes brimming with indignation and fury. "Fuck! That Haydson really is a shameless bastard throwing his age around! Olivier is only in his forties, while he's a centuries-old monster. As if leaving Olivier with a badly wounded soul, his life hanging in the balance, wasn't enough, he turned around and set his sights on our lord! There are so many Saint Realm experts in the imperial capital he could fight, so many personal disciples of the War God Sect he could choose, but he just had to pick our lord!"
"Exactly!" Wharton's face was anxious as well, his knuckles whitening around the war saber Carnage. "Big brother, you're only twenty-seven, and your human form hasn't even reached the Saint Realm. Haydson's physical defense isn't just absurd-he even withstood Olivier's terrifying light-and-darkness attack and soul attack head-on. And his final move, Earth Split, was like mountains collapsing and the earth caving in! You shouldn't have accepted!"
Barker's normally composed face was equally grave. "My lord, my brothers and I watched that fight clearly from the front. An ordinary Peak Saint Realm expert would have been cleaved in two by Olivier's final strike, but Haydson was merely knocked back and spat blood. Ordinary Saint Realm battle-qi simply can't account for his defense."
Jenny and Rebecca stood to one side, their beautiful eyes filled with worry and distress.
Only Doehring Cowart, dressed in a moon-white robe, sat calmly in a guest seat, sipping his tea.
Linley sat in the seat of honor, listening to everyone's indignation. Yet there was no trace of anger or impatience on his face. Instead, a faint, thoughtful smile appeared.
"That's enough, Wharton, Barker." Linley set down his teacup, his voice calm and unhurried. "Among warriors, attainment comes first. Haydson has been famous for centuries. If reputation were all he cared about, he could simply maintain his airs as the strongest in the Saint Realm and ignore me. He dared to challenge me because he sensed a fellow practitioner of the Laws of the Earth in my Black Jade Heavy Sword and profound truths."
Linley turned to Doehring. "Grandpa Doehring, did you see it clearly?"
Stroking his long beard, Doehring smiled slightly. "Perfectly clearly. Haydson's path through the Laws of the Earth isn't the Pulsation you've comprehended, but the earth's 'weight' and 'concentration of force.' He condensed the power of the earth into mountain armor. He even used the earth's capacity to embrace all things to envelop his organs, bones, and even the soul within his mind in a dense gravitational field. When Olivier's soul spike pierced his mind, that layer of dense earth power diminished most of its force. That was why it failed to kill him."
"The weight of the earth, protecting even the organs and soul..." A sharp gleam flickered in Linley's eyes as he murmured thoughtfully.
"Big brother, if he has almost no weaknesses, how are you going to fight him in three months?" Wharton could not help asking.
"Who says he has no weaknesses?" Linley abruptly rose, like a heavy sword returned to its sheath, its edge concealed. "His defense is indeed flawless, but his understanding of the earth follows the path of forcibly concentrating power. When it comes to vibration, rhythm, and penetration... he's inferior to me."
Linley looked at everyone and solemnly instructed, "Starting tomorrow, for three months, unless something of immense importance happens at the imperial palace, no one is to set foot inside my private courtyard. I'm going into seclusion."
"Yes, my lord!" the five Barker brothers answered in unison.
Early the next morning, in the private courtyard on the eastern side of the earl's manor.
The courtyard gate was shut, and all was quiet and cool inside. Only the breeze stirred the old tree's branches and leaves, producing a soft rustle.
Haeru had assumed the form of a Black-Striped Cloud Leopard over ten feet long and lay quietly just inside the gate, resting with his eyes closed. Bebe perched high atop the courtyard wall, holding a spirit fruit in his little paws, his lively eyes scanning his surroundings vigilantly.
At the center of the courtyard, Linley stood barefoot on the bluestone paving.
He had not drawn the Black Jade Heavy Sword in his hand. Its tip merely rested against the ground at an angle, while he stood like a sculpture unmoving through the ages.
Linley slowly closed his eyes.
Thump... thump...
The earth's pulsations slowly traveled up from deep beneath his feet, like its heavy heartbeat-vast, boundless, and mighty, yet filled with endless vitality and fluctuations.
Every instant of Haydson and Olivier's battle above the Chiyan River the previous night replayed over and over in Linley's mind.
That thin layer of earthen-yellow waves covering Haydson's body when he swung his fist to meet Olivier's Black Stone Sword head-on!
The waves hugged his body, seemingly only a few inches thick. Yet the instant the Black Stone Sword struck, mysterious ripples spread through them, completely dissipating the chopping force of tens of thousands of pounds.
In the past, I always treated Earth Pulsation as an unstoppable means of destruction...
Linley silently worked through the possibilities.
During his four years of arduous training in Yunfeng Town, he had comprehended Hundredfold Waves. Now he had developed his vibration waves to 128 layers. A silent thrust of his sword could shatter every internal organ of an Azure Wind Eagle a thousand meters overhead, and could even pass through protective battle-qi to severely wound a Saint Realm expert.
This was destruction from the inside out.
But if the earth can support all things, why can't it be used to protect oneself?
Haydson's defense is terrifying because he condenses earth essence to the utmost, using "weight" to withstand outside force head-on. But that defense is still static. Faced with Olivier's desperate strike fusing light and darkness, his armor still shattered, and he still spat blood.
What if... I used the earth's pulsations in reverse?
Linley suddenly opened his eyes. Deep within his dark-brown eyes, tiny glimmers of earth seemed to burn!
A thin sheet of paper tears with a gentle tug. But if that sheet is cut into six narrow strips and woven together into a rope like a braid, wouldn't the tension it could withstand increase by far more than several dozen times?
An ordinary Saint Realm battle-qi shield merely spreads battle-qi evenly over the body, like a thin sheet of paper. No matter how abundant the battle-qi, it only withstands blows rigidly. But if I used Earth Pulsation's rhythm to weave Dragonblood Battle Qi into hundreds or thousands of endlessly renewing pulsing membranes, vibrating minutely at tremendous speed...
Linley steadied his breathing, and the ninth-level Dragonblood Battle Qi within him surged into motion!
Hiss, hiss-
Wisps of deep blue-black Dragonblood Battle Qi seeped from every pore of Linley's body, slowly swirling around him.
Linley closed his eyes and concentrated, immersing his mind completely in the earth's vast fluctuations as he tried to guide the battle-qi covering his body into harmony with the rhythm of the earth's pulsations beneath his feet.
At first, the battle-qi merely churned like ordinary waves of energy.
No, too slow. This is just ordinary battle-qi release.
Linley frowned slightly. With a shift of his mind, the battle-qi began rotating faster. But as soon as its speed increased, it became violent and chaotic, even beginning to collide with and tear at itself, producing shrill explosions.
I mustn't be impatient. The earth is steady and vast. Pulsation is the natural rhythm of heaven and earth, not the collisions of a raging storm...
Linley cast aside every distracting thought and completely relaxed his body and mind.
He seemed to become a speck of dust deep within the soil, sensing the extension and resonance of the earth's veins across countless miles of mountains and rivers. One layer, two layers, three layers... The blue-black waves surrounding his body gradually stopped churning violently. Instead, like tiny ripples spreading across water in the morning, they began trembling rapidly in an extremely high-frequency, extremely minute pattern!
Day after day passed.
Outside the courtyard, the atmosphere throughout the O'Brien imperial capital grew increasingly tense and fervent. Countless adventurers, mercenaries, and nobles from every region poured into Chiyan City like a tide, awaiting the Peak Saint Realm showdown three months later.
Within Earl Wharton's manor, even the servants tiptoed as they walked, afraid of disturbing the pillar of the household in seclusion.
In the blink of an eye, dusk fell on the twelfth day of his seclusion.
Inside the courtyard, the blue-black battle-qi mist had condensed to within three feet of Linley. It looked as thin as smoke, but a closer look revealed countless ripples as fine and dense as spiderwebs circulating within the blue-black currents at a dizzying speed!
"Big brother, it's time for dinner!"
Heavy footsteps sounded outside the courtyard gate as Wharton arrived with the five Barker brothers.
For the past twelve days, Wharton had come to check on him every day after practicing his saber. Linley had remained motionless in that same posture. If not for the faint rise and fall of his chest, he would have looked like a stone statue.
"Wharton, our lord is still contemplating. Don't go in," Barker advised in a low voice.
"He hasn't eaten or drunk anything for twelve whole days." Wharton was a little anxious. "Saint Realm experts may be able to go without food, but how can his body withstand this indefinitely? I'll wake him and persuade him to rest a little."
Wharton strode into the courtyard and headed straight toward Linley.
Lying atop the wall, Bebe glanced at Wharton and lazily flicked his tail, transmitting, "Little Wharton, I'd advise you not to go over there. The boss is in a very strange state right now."
"It's fine. Big brother wouldn't hurt me."
Wharton thought nothing of it. When he came within five feet of Linley, he felt an extremely faint blue-black breeze brush his face. That battle-qi looked even thinner than an ordinary Eighth-level Warrior's protective waves. Without guarding himself at all, Wharton simply reached out to place his hand on Linley's shoulder.
But the instant Wharton's fingers touched the outer edge of that blue-black breeze-
Boom!!
An enormous, uncanny force of indiscernible origin suddenly erupted against Wharton's palm!
It was not a single impact at all. In that instant, dozens of violent pulsations of differing frequencies struck in succession like heavy hammers! Each pulsation surged precisely up along his bones and muscles, tearing through his protective battle-qi layer by layer!
"Pfft!"
Wharton's burly, iron-tower-like body flew backward through the air like a boulder hurled from a catapult, hurtling more than ten meters toward the courtyard wall!
"Wharton!"
Gates, standing at the courtyard entrance, blanched in shock. Kicking off the ground, he charged forward like a bull and locked both arms around Wharton's waist and back in midair. His feet gouged two deep furrows in the ground before he finally stopped their momentum.
Wharton landed on the ground. A sweet, bloody taste rose in his throat, and a trickle of blood spilled from the corner of his mouth. His eyes were filled with horror and shock!
"Th-this... what is this?!" Pressing his painfully aching chest, Wharton stared in alarm at Linley, who still stood in the courtyard with his eyes closed. "I only touched the outermost wisp of battle-qi, and I was struck by dozens of successive vibrations?!"
Gates also sucked in a cold breath, his bull-like eyes widening. "Holy mother! Our lord didn't even move, and his protective battle-qi alone sent Wharton, who's on the verge of the Saint Realm, flying and coughing blood?! If all that power went into a sword strike, who could block it?!"
Barker hurried forward to support Wharton, his expression more serious than ever. "Don't go near him! The battle-qi covering our lord's body has already formed its own pulsations of heaven and earth... That isn't an ordinary battle-qi shield. It's a manifestation of the laws!"
Bebe grinned broadly atop the wall. "Serves you right. I warned you, but you wouldn't listen."
Wharton wiped the blood from his lips. At that moment, all the worry in his eyes turned to wild joy and excitement. "Big brother... big brother succeeded! Hahaha, wonderful! Barker, send the order at once. Make the area within a hundred meters of the courtyard off-limits, and triple the guards. Anyone who dares approach is to be killed on sight!"
"Yes!"
In the blink of an eye, another three days passed.
It was noon on the fifteenth full day, the blazing sun high overhead.
Whoosh-
A long, lingering exhalation suddenly sounded in the courtyard.
The blue-black waves shrouding the three feet around Linley had already condensed into something resembling divine armor of deep-blue glass. With that gentle exhalation, they obediently transformed into countless strands of flowing light, like rivers returning to the sea, swiftly contracting and sinking into every inch of his flesh and meridians.
The breeze ceased, and the leaves settled.
Linley slowly opened his eyes. The divine gleam faded from his dark-golden eyes, which returned to a deep, tranquil brown.
He lowered his head to look at his hands, a relaxed, carefree smile spreading across his face.
"Fifteen whole days..."
Linley gently clenched his fists.
With a slight thought, a blue-black pulsing membrane as thin as a cicada's wing instantly fitted itself over his skin, rapidly oscillating ripples flowing across its surface. There was no roar of violent battle-qi, no dazzling radiance. Yet the defensive strength of this almost imperceptible membrane had increased by far more than fiftyfold compared with his former rigid Saint Realm battle-qi shield!
If an ordinary Saint Realm expert struck with full power, before the blade even touched his flesh, this high-frequency pulsation would dissipate most of the battle-qi within it layer by layer, discharging it into the surrounding space.
"The Profound Truths of the Earth: Hundredfold Waves for attack, Pulse Guard for defense."
Linley gently stroked the Black Jade Heavy Sword at his waist and murmured, "Pulsing Defense outside, dissipating force layer by layer, and steel-hard dragon scales protecting me within when I fully dragonform... Haydson, what can your Earth Split do to me?"
Clap, clap, clap.
Crisp applause sounded at the courtyard entrance.
At some point, Doehring Cowart had appeared before the steps in his moon-white robe, his hands clasped behind his back. His white hair stirred gently in the breeze, and his aged eyes brimmed with undisguised wonder and gratification.
"What a Pulsing Defense!" Doehring walked into the courtyard, praising him. "Great skill appears simple. You've incorporated the ultimate principles of Earth Pulsation into protective battle-qi. Linley, the distance you've now traveled along the path of Earth Pulsation has already far surpassed Saint Realm experts at your level. Even... when this old man was a Saint Realm mage, my understanding of the Earth Element was never as thorough as yours."
Linley turned and bowed, smiling. "You flatter me, Grandpa Doehring. If I hadn't personally witnessed Haydson's 'weight of the earth' at the Chiyan River, I never would have imagined that battle-qi defense could be used this way."
Doehring smiled and shook his head. "Haydson relies on centuries of arduous training to overwhelm others with weight. His defense seems flawless, but in truth, he builds a fortress out of power. Your Pulsing Defense, however, borrows the rhythm of heaven and earth to dissipate force without a trace. In conception, yours is already a notch above his."
Fighting spirit rose in Linley's eyes as he gazed toward the western sky. "Of the three months, only a little over two remain. In the battle at Tujiao Mountain, I truly want to see whether his heavy mountains of earth are tougher, or whether my earth's pulsations are superior!"
Just then, a gentle knock sounded at the courtyard gate, and Wharton and Delia appeared outside.
Looking at Linley, radiant and vigorous, his presence as deep as a still pool and as imposing as a mountain, Delia's beautiful eyes softened. The worry that had gripped her for half a month finally eased completely.
"Big brother, you're out of seclusion!" Wharton hurried over excitedly.
Linley looked at everyone and smiled. "I've made you all worry. Tell the kitchen to prepare some food and wine. Once we've eaten and drunk our fill... we'll simply await the battle at Tujiao Mountain on August 4!"