Chapter 95: Arc 6: Chapter 1

Bianca splashed her face with the cool river water and once the ripples settled, had a look at her reflection. It was, naturally, unchanged from her latest breakthrough, though she almost felt unnaturally clean despite being out in the wilds for quite some time. Dirt refused to stick to her skin – though the same couldn’t be said for her own sweat – and her hair remained rather tidy, never tangling or otherwise proving to be a nuisance.

She sighed as she looked into the crimson reflection of her eyes. While she was more than happy about the reduced need for keeping herself clean, it was still difficult to get used to seeing someone else in the mirror – or river, in this case.

Anyway, her abnormal cleanliness helped her look more the part of a Queen, even if the Demon Queen had relinquished control not long after the tribulation was done. In and of itself, it didn’t concern her, but another side effect – presumably, she had no idea what the exact nature or origin was – did, mainly because she had no idea quite how far it went.

There wasn’t a way to say it without being at least a little crass. She no longer needed to go to the toilet for anything beyond pissing, which was… good, naturally. However, she had no idea if that was supposed to happen at this realm, nor whether this would be a permanent thing.

If it was, then not needing to ever clean up back there certainly wouldn’t be an issue. It just would be embarrassing if she learned that it wasn’t the case mid-activity that involved it.

She might’ve asked, but it was rather embarrassing to question anyone about such a thing, so she had refrained from it. Instead, she had simply elected to wait it out and see, and if things continued as they were, then she would know and put that knowledge to use in some way. For one, she could get Song Ming to lick her back there without needing to worry about things being unclean, and the other option involved a certain blacksmith with a huge cock.

As much as she didn’t want to admit it, there was something really, really alluring about that woman, and her scent, and her dick. It wasn’t to the point of her not being able to live without it – something that was likely true for Song Ming, as much as she didn’t enjoy the fact that she had inflicted such a fate unwittingly – but she did think about it a little more than she should’ve at times when she had little else to consider.

She was rather tempted to let the blacksmith make use of her ass again, though this time, she’d be sure to get on top and take charge even more, not let Han Rushu do anything she didn’t agree to.

‘Though… I still have those butt plugs, though I can’t really confirm whether Song Ming can wear them without issue like I could,’ Bianca sighed, getting up and brushing away a strand of loose blonde hair.

She had styled her hair into a ponytail for convenience, though as she became more and more certain of her ability to resist regular dust and grime via some miraculous means of the Demonic Tyrant and the body cultivation technique it bestowed, she considered going a little further and giving herself a nicer hairstyle, one that she could spend longer on with the knowledge that she wouldn’t need to undo it regularly.

It would take some time to come up with it, so she didn’t bother trying anything now, but she did already have a few ideas to think over when the appropriate time came.

For now, she had already spent way too long looking at herself and pondering topics she had thought she’d never actually think about, so she returned the way she came and returned to the group, which had set up camp in a clearing in the woods.

The river wasn’t too far away from the camp, so it only took her a minute to arrive to the pleasant warmth of a small campfire that illuminated the single large tent and the two smaller tents on the other side. Bianca, Song Ming and Yu Juan slept in the largest tent, then Xue Yaling and Han Rushu opted to sleep in the smaller tents.

She might’ve been curious as to why Xue Yaling didn’t try to squeeze in with the rest of them, but a single moment of thought led her to conclude that this was perfectly in line with how the kitsune had behaved up to this point. Perhaps she assumed that if she left Bianca ‘alone’ with two others that she found attractive, she’d be more likely to make use of the Demon’s Commanding Rod and advance whatever ideas Xue Yaling had cooked up within her mind. Or perhaps she was just a voyeur that enjoyed watching others have sex, who knows.

‘I wonder if even she knows. That kitsune is just weird sometimes…’ Bianca sighed as she approached the fire, where the other four were already sitting and chatting quietly.

“Ah, Bianca! There you are. Tell us, do you prefer boobs or butts?” Xue Yaling called out as she approached, likely having detected her approach long ago.

“… What?”

“We were just debating which one you prefer.”

“… Why?”

“Just answer the question and we can move along. It’s not something that requires a lot of debate,” Xue Yaling shrugged and crossed her arms as though this was all Bianca’s fault.

“Wha… Uh, you know what, fine. Butts. Happy?”

“Hm, perhaps. How convenient that all of us have pretty good backsides, as if you are a queen collecting her very own collection of wives and concubines. I’m sure that you’ve picked each and every one of us out-”

“Shut the fuck up,” Han Rushu cut her off, “I already want to stab her after just a few days on the road, so I’m amazed that you’ve endured her for so much longer.”

“What was that, you bitch?”

“Exactly what you already heard, slut. Need me to repeat it louder?”

“Calm down, both of you… though if you do decide to stab Xue Yaling, I’d like to join in,” Bianca added the second part as quietly as she could, “Anyway, we have a long journey ahead of us, as far as I understand, so if we are already trying to kill one another like this, then we will not last the rest of the trip.”

“True. See, speaking the words that befit a leader.”

“Do shut the fuck up, though.”

“How quickly they grow up.”

Bianca sighed and sat down beside Song Ming, with Yu Juan happening to be not far from her on the other side.

“Here, Mistress, you can have a bite first.”

They had caught some low realm planar beasts earlier in the day, and so now they were cooking pieces over the flame as a way to pass the time. Afterwards, they’d struggle to bring much of the meat with them, besides what Han Rushu helpfully dried using some of her energy. Although she used some kind of Beast archetype, she had trained to handle the forge extensively, and thus naturally knew a way to make a flame for whatever purpose she required.

Anyway, Bianca had no clue how any kind of dried meat was made, and she didn’t especially care to pay attention, but what she had tried proved rather appealing in its own way. While the strips of dried meat were tough and challenged her jaw quite a bit – more than Han Rushu had, even – each bite ended up rather filling and fulfilling.

“Thanks, sweetheart,” she replied, taking the stick on which a chunk of meat was placed, fat dripping down onto the flame below as the surface slowly turned brown, with parts beginning to char ever so slightly.

Since the planar beast they captured was slightly poisonous, it was best to cook beyond the point of certainty, though that didn’t prevent it from being perfectly palatable. It was, after all, difficult to significantly damage it with ordinary flame, so all the charring and burning would be limited to the outside and to a thin and insignificant layer.

“Cute… anyway, we’re going to the east, and so we’ll be nearing the Phoenix Sect. Despite being in the same central region of the continent as all of our destinations so far, that place is rich in various kinds of flame-type items, thereby causing the region to be hotter and more… well, if this place is more of a typical, cool forested area, then the place we’ll arrive at is a sort of rainforest. Expect lots of moisture, heat and a lot of vegetation.”

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“Is that how it works? Some fire things lie on the ground and suddenly the entire region transforms?”

“It’s not that simple, but more or less. Items of significant power, such as materials and beasts infused with planar energy, will influence the area around them. If you had a ninth realm material somewhere, it would be able to change the whole area on its own, if it was present in sufficient quantities.”

“Damn…”

The others looked at her for a while, likely questioning the reason for her confusion – with the exception of the kitsune, though she probably already got the confusion out of her system while replying – before the conversation returned to its track.

“Anyway, be prepared for this and don’t complain when all of your clothing gets soaked through with your sweat in the first moment that you put it on… unfortunately, there’s not a tradition of going around naked there, though it’s likely for the best when considering the various insects, large and small, that fill that place. Perhaps the only one here that can disregard this is Bianca, seeing as her skin is tough enough for a low-grade artefact to struggle to pierce it.”

“Eh… thanks? I hadn’t actually thought about that before, but yeah, I should be immune to bug bites… fucking finally… although I hadn’t seen any bugs around here since I woke up in the village…” Bianca frowned, ‘Where the fuck have all the bugs have been? Huh, I never even noticed this, but I don’t recall any mosquito bites or anything similarly annoying, so that’s odd.’

Of course, it might just be that the memories of such things had been buried beneath the stress that had filled her mind at the time, and the birth of an alternate personality that had apparently occurred around then.

She still hadn’t determined whether it was caused directly by her trauma or if the Demonic Tyrant had gotten involved – not that she had any opportunities to do so when considering the fact that it was impossible for anyone else in this world to detect the presence of that strange thing – but it seemed like that personality wasn’t planning to flare up more often after her breakthrough, fortunately enough. Whether it was because breaking through thanks to it didn’t matter, or for some other reason, the outcome was the most important detail for the moment.

“Speaking of, Bianca, you ought to have tested your abilities without us by now, right? You’ve verified that you’re not going to injure anyone if you use them, so would you mind showing them off? I’d like to have a better idea of what you’re capable of to determine where to best place you during our entrance into the Phoenix Sect.”

“I did test them… Fine, I’ll do that,” she sighed, rising and unsheathing the blade she had by her side.

Since she managed to carry a weapon on her person at all times even back when she had a kitchen knife as her only tool of defence, she had gotten used to bringing around shard objects, and with the sheath that the blade came with, it meant there was minimal risk of harming herself or anyone else with it. The worst thing about carrying it with her was just that it was a mild inconvenience whenever she wanted to sit down on a low seat, or on the ground.

Regardless, her breakthrough had not granted her any new skills, not that she expected any by this point. Instead, just as with her previous step, every single skill she had grew stronger, and with the anchor, the difference was rather significant.

For instance, the Abyssal Shield could protect a larger area at the same strength, and when she concentrated it to the same extent as before, it felt much stronger, or far stronger once she involved the anchor. She didn’t test the Demon’s Commanding Rod, but it was obviously going to grow more, though she wasn’t yet sure to which extent. The Demonic Form had shown its changes already, so there was little to demonstrate. Therefore, out of what she could really showcase, there was only Dominion’s Light and Tormentor’s Strides.

The latter wasn’t especially interesting, as it just improved to allow her to move even more quickly, but the former was certainly quite the spectacle – a dangerous one, but a spectacle nonetheless.

She held her blade up and to the side, flooded the weapon with energy and nearly blinded herself with the sheer vividness of the crimson that arose. It went far beyond merely dying the edge of the black blade with lightning and spread out further, the brightest spot still being along the edge of her weapon, but a lot of lightning spilled out all around, striking the ground and arcing all over the place, with every flash of lightning charring the land and trees that they struck.

“And this is without the anchor… Impressive,” Xue Yaling muttered, “Go on, then.”

“Shush,” Bianca glanced back, then focused her frustration into her skill and looked onto the biggest, toughest tree in sight.

Then, with a swing, she unleashed all that power. At once, it was as though the tribulation had returned in crimson form, striking down in the forest, but this time it was wielded through Bianca’s sword, and with a single swing a wave was unleashed, crackling and slicing through everything in her path.

The tree she targeted bore the brunt of her effort, and the energy within tore apart the bark, instantly splitting the tree in half and leaving the upper part to crumble to the ground.

Everything behind it, and to the sides – she did perform a rather wide swing, after all – also suffered, though no trees of comparable size were felled as the remaining energy wasn’t quite sufficient. Nevertheless, her lightning felt significantly more real, more solid, even, than before, and if unleashed in any other manner, would be far more effective than before even if she attacked with zero malicious intent.

Similarly, the energy within her had grown even thicker than that, forming into a solid spherical mass within her dantian, a great orb of crimson, black and violet mixed together in a peculiar way. As far as she could tell, this was the solid energy of the third realm, and the crimson lightning she could release was considered to be liquid… somehow.

‘Lightning is plasma, or supposed to be, while planar energy… energy shouldn’t have a physical form like that unless it’s a battery or something,’ she grumbled to herself, though she knew that none of the others would understand.

“Impressive. Either you really wanted the forest dead, or you received quite the improvement thanks to your realm,” Xue Yaling said.

“Fuck you.”

“Sure. Anyway, in case you’re unaware – or forgot – it’s not common for skills and techniques to be suitable and effective from first to ninth realm. Typically, each one will be designed around the capabilities and limitations of a certain realm, often someone using that specific archetype’s techniques, and then, when one advances sufficiently, they will have to turn to superior skills designed for their increased capabilities,” the kitsune explained, “So, for you to simply progress step by step like that… is unusual.”

“That’s putting it mildly. There’s a good chance all of us won’t be able to do much in higher realms if we don’t find the right skills, and here you are, just doing whatever you want…”

The blacksmith didn’t follow her words up with much, so everyone was left to guess exactly what she intended to say, but ultimately it was obvious that Bianca’s situation was highly abnormal and jealousy-inducing.

“Are they really improving, though? It’s just more energy being used, surely.”

“It’s not that simple, Bianca. There is a major difference between simply wasting more energy to inefficiently empower a lower realm skill to using a higher realm skill as it was intended to be used. In your case – and apparently without any of your knowledge – the skill progresses with your realm, going from a simple empowerment at the first realm, a weak ranged attack at the second, and now a powerful ranged blast at the third.”

“Now that you mention it, I guess they are rather different…” she had to agree, even if the differences felt rather like the influence of her energy, not the properties of the skill itself.

“I’m sure I explained this before, but to clarify it for you: a first realm skill would be useless at the second since it cannot possibly include components for externalised energy, the major advantage of all realms above the first. In the third realm, it is possible to design significantly stronger skills thanks to the liquid state of external energy combined with the presence of an anchor. From the fourth onwards, energy can be stabilised permanently, meaning that skills producing minions and the like are significantly more powerful,” the kitsune listed off the realms one by one.

“From the fifth, implementing the ignition of a searing mark can allow for yet more powerful skills, creating a burst of might that cannot be rivalled without another searing mark, not to mention the advantage of solid energy. In the sixth realm, all marks contribute to your overall strength, so everything can once more be redesigned with that in mind. The seventh… well, you understand the point, surely.”

“Yeah… and skills don’t typically come with a bunch of variants to be used at different realms?”

“Rarely, and even then, a single principle cannot be useful forever. As you ascend through the realms of cultivation, it is inevitable that skills would be switched for superior ones.”

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