The ease with which Ji Ning and the Ninedust Sectlord had slaughtered the first squad to attack them, forcing the attackers to flee in disarray, caused the Heartforce Cultivators who were ‘spying’ on the fight to feel stunned.
“What’s going on? Who is that silver-robed man? How can he be this powerful?” Winesage asked anxiously.
“Does anyone know who the silver-robed man is?”
“Does anyone know where he comes from?”
“All I know is that he is an Ancient cultivator who is on par with me,” Fiendqueen Dustrain replied.
“Since when did the Ancient cultivators suddenly give birth to such a terrifyingly powerful Daolord?”
The Heartforce Cultivators instantly began to spread this information to the other Daolords and ask them about it. Of the many Daolords present, there actually were a few who knew about Ninedust.
“The Ancient cultivators do have an incredibly talented Daolord known as Redwater who is skilled in staff-arts and walks the Dao of Water. He has become the new Sectlord of the Ninedust Sect! However, when I knew him he wasn’t nearly this powerful.”
“Yes, when I used my heartworld projection to suppress them, I overheard Daolord Darknorth refer to him as ‘Ninedust’.”
“The Ninedust Sectlord?”
“Daolord Redwater, the Ninedust Sectlord?”
There were simply far too many Daolords clustered within the Waveshift Realm. Even the most low-key of Daolords would still be known to some. All Daolords had to experience danger and train in order to grow more powerful. They’d naturally run into other Daolords during the process.
……
The many Daolords present all understood that to withstand Darknorth and Ninedust would be no easy task! Ninedust was already on par with King Gorsch, while Darknorth was a Heartforce Cultivator. The two complimented each other very well.
……
“Fuck off!” Ning let out a furious roar as his heartforce surged out in a wave via his [Dreamstar] art towards the five Daolords who had come to stop them.
After going through the Ancient Hegemon’s relic site, studying the Dreamdust script, and traversing the Thundersouth Palace as well as using the Stone Censer of Reunion for many years, Ning had reached an extremely high level in the [Dreamstar] art. By now, his illusions were on par with even the illusions that had been within the Thundersouth Palace, and even Ninedust had repeatedly been tricked by the illusions in Thundersouth Palace!
When Ning used this technique, the vast majority of second-tier Daolords would be affected by it. And in truth, this was nothing much. When Daolord Featherdress had used her [Featherdress Soulthrall Song], no non-Heartforce Cultivator Daolord was able to resist it, including the other supreme first-tier Daolords! This was what made Heartforce Cultivators so terrifying.
“Ahhh!”
“Where am I?”
Four of the five Daolords were trapped within illusions. The remaining one, upon seeing this, didn’t dare to attack.
“Let’s go.” Ning and the others didn’t want to waste any time. They immediately used their flying vessel to escape at high speeds.
“What just happened? How could we all have been trapped in illusions?”
“My Dao-heart is incredibly powerful. How did I end up within an illusion as well?”
When the other four Daolords came to their senses, they were so frightened they felt cold sweat drip down their backs.
“If it hadn’t been for Daolord Darknorth, the five of us could’ve joined forces to cause the Ninedust Sectlord quite a few problems. Ugh. They’ve joined forces. Blocking them is going to be extremely difficult.” After personally experiencing the power of this combination, the squad instantly understood how terrifyingly strong the Ning-Ninedust team was.
……
It was true. The Ning-Ninedust team was virtually unstoppable. Both of them had extremely powerful secret arts, and Ning’s heartworld projection was able to push back repeatedly at Sectlord Timedream’s heartworld projection. Although his own projection was repeatedly destroyed by Timedream’s, their secret arts were strong enough to allow them to endure the rest. Thus, they weren’t slowed down in the slightest.
As far as combat power went? Although they were repeatedly outnumbered by second-tier Daolords, Ning would cast his heartforce illusions upon them from afar, and the majority of them would immediately fall for it! There was just no way to slow them down at all.
……
In the blink of an eye, Ning’s group had spent nineteen days in flight. On the way, they had suffered quite a few attacks by Daolord squads, with two of the attacks being quite difficult to deal with. They had fought at maximum speed and managed to kill five of the Daolords.
“Eh?” Ning and Ninedust suddenly stared towards the front.
“Something’s off.” Ning’s eyes narrowed as he stared towards a red-robed youth who was flying towards them from afar. The red-robed youth’s eyes were extremely bright, and they glistened like the stars. Ning had a heavy look on his face. “He actually dares to intercept us by himself. He knows how strong we are, but he still dares to challenge us. He is very possibly a supreme Daolord.”
“Yes. Even worse, he doesn’t seem to be one of the more famous ones. We have no idea what his skills lie in.” Ninedust had a bad feeling as well. This was the first time during their flight that a sole Daolord had moved to intercept them by himself!
“Brother Darknorth. Brother Ninedust. My Daoist title is ‘Snowjoy’. I feel rather embarrassed; this is our first time meeting each other, and we’re about to get into a fight right away.” The red-robed youth laughed brightly. “Why don’t you hand over the Voidsea Jadeseal. Now that I’m here, you won’t be able to escape.”
“You think quite highly of yourself.” Ninedust smirked.
As for Ning, a cold light flashed through his eyes as he immediately sent out his [Dreamstar] art. The red-robed youth, however, just continued to stand there with a smile on his face in front of them. When the [Dreamstar] art swept past the man, the man simply continued to smile. His smile had a strange charisma to it, and his eyes only shone even brighter as he looked at Ninedust. “Brother Ninedust?”
“Hmph.” The Ninedust Sectlord let out a cold snort. “So you are actually skilled in illusions as well.”
“Alas, my illusions can in no way compare to brother Darknorth’s. He is a true Heartforce Cultivator, after all.” The red-robed youth smiled.
Ning’s face tightened as he sent mentally to Ning, “Ninedust, my [Dreamstar] did nothing to him.”
“He is probably a supreme Daolord! Supreme Daolords almost all have incredibly powerful souls and Dao-hearts. Their souls won’t be easily shaken by illusions. Don’t worry. Leave it to me.” The Ninedust Sectlord glared coldly at the distant red-robed youth, then barked, “Daolord Snowjoy? Hmph! Let’s see if you really are strong enough to bar my path.”
“After you.” The red-robed youth smiled gracefully, then flew over.
“Attack!” The Ninedust Sectlord swept through the skies, his longstaff expanding to become ten thousand kilometers long as he slammed it towards the opponent in front of him. The space around him actually twisted into a vortex, with that longstaff being at the center of the vortex as it smashed towards the red-robed youth.
The red-robed youth instantly manifested a total of six ivory-white arms. His six arms spread out like the plumes of a peacock, launching palm-strikes, finger-strikes, claw-strikes, and other attacks towards the Ninedust Sectlord.
Thud! An extremely soft and light collision could be heard. The red-robed youth’s body trembled slightly before he then continued to press the attack against Ninedust.
“Die.” The Ninedust Sectlord spun his staff around his waist as he prepared for another strike. The longstaff was like a Flood Dragon leaving the waters, causing great waves to appear in the area that crashed downwards towards the red-robed youth.
Boom!
Hiss!
Bang!
The red-robed youth’s attacks were extremely graceful. No matter how ferocious the Ninedust Sectlord’s attacks were, the youth was able to defend against them with extremely delicate strikes. He was able to use his six hands alone to defend against Ninedust’s longstaff without suffering the slightest of disadvantages.
Ning grew increasingly anxious as he watched. If this continued, the battle could go on for several days without any resolution.
Swoosh! Ning suddenly vanished as he used his Shadowless evasion skill to move closer to the red-robed youth.
“You wish to ambush me?” The red-robed youth’s godsense had been activated this entire time, and so he naturally was able to notice as Ning drew close to him. He let out a soft laugh. “you are a Heartforce Cultivator. If you hid far away, I wouldn’t be able to do anything to you… but you actually dare to deliver yourself into my hands?”
“Kill!” Six streams of light appeared simultaneously as Ning manifested [Three Heads, Six Arms] and sent his six Northbow swords to attack his opponent.
“Screw off.” The red-robed youth casually waved a single hand to slap back at him.
Bang! The tips of the swords collided against the center of the red-robed youth’s palm. The youth’s face instantly changed. He had thought that he would be able to deliver a heavy blow to Ning with a single hand, but Ning had used the most powerful attack available to him – the Blood Drop stance. This stance, when used with the Northbow swords, contained incredible power!
Although Ning felt the tremendous power contained within that palm-strike, the defensive prowess of his sword-arts allowed him to deflect and ablate much of that power with one sword. He also had the Hegemon armor, allowing him to take on as much of the strike as possible so as to ensure that his other five swords were not disrupted by the attack. Thus, the other five Northbow swords continued to fly mercilessly towards the red-robed youth.
“I told you to screw off!” The red-robed youth was irritated now. He sent three of his ivory-white palms towards Ning in a fierce assault, his palms growing in size as he slapped out towards Ning.
Boom! Boom! Boom! Ning was knocked flying backwards.
Boom! The Ninedust Sectlord suddenly landed a blow with his longstaff against the red-robed youth’s waist, knocking him flying backwards as well. The youth spat a mouthful of blood out.
“Damn.” The red-robed youth quickly righted himself in midair, a look of anger in his eyes as he smiled coldly towards the distant Ning. “Impressive, Darknorth. I didn’t expect you to be this strong in close combat! You caught me slightly off-guard… and you didn’t even spit out any blood after taking a hit from me! Impressive, impressive.”
Ning was stronger than he had expected. He had to use at least thirty to forty percent of his power to deal with Ning, but this meant that he would no longer be able to fend off the Ninedust Sectlord.