‘Twisting Tempest Thrust – First Form!’
FWOOSH!
Immediately, from one of his liberated pathways, energy began to gather on the tip of Virus’ longsword as he thrust it like a spear at the rushing cow.
Bam!
Both opponents were flung backward.
While the cow seemed a little dizzy, Virus’s arm felt numb.
MOOO!
Still, intent on ripping Virus apart, the cow lunged at him once more!
“Huh! Come!” Virus’s eyes shined brightly as he sensed nothing but exhilaration at the struggle he was going through. It was at times like this that he felt most alive.
‘Twisting Tempest Thrust – Second Form!’
As he went into stance, twice the former energy started radiating off from both of his pathways before they gathered on the sharp end of the longsword.
However, it wasn’t merely gathering this time. Rather, the energy was clearly in a restless state as they created wind-like turbulences and fluctuations on the very tip itself.
MOOO-
FWISH!
As the cow roared in wrath, Virus’ weapon was launched and the two clashed head-on!
BAM!!!
Prttt~
Instantly, the longsword penetrated the cow’s head right into its brain as the creature went down. After creating a trail as long as a few meters on the ground with its corpse, it finally stopped moving!
“Haaa…. Phewww!” Taking a deep breath, Virus deactivated his longsword as it disintegrated into his ring again.
Pitter-patter~
“That felt great!” He proclaimed looking up and closing his eyes as he enjoyed the sensation of droplets of rain that had just begun.
…
Over the next two days, Virus continued his hunt while resting in the spaceship at night.
SWISH!
Right now, he was just done slashing the neck of a huge fish-like creature that apparently lived on land.
During these two days, he had been enjoying his hunt so much that no thoughts other than the monsters that he killed had occupied his mind.
He had long forgotten everything distracting and irrelevant as he only felt engrossed in the sensation of the kill and the pleasure it resulted in! The only notion going through his head was how great it felt to take a life that would in return benefit him!
Then, just as he was about to head to his next target, his energy began to bubble up, this promptly focused his attention on his physique as he checked what was happening.
‘Hmm, so I’m finally breaking through!’
Following that, as the fusion of his third pathway was complete, his energy automatically rushed out into the world while the Origin unlocked his fifteenth single pathway. And next came the breakthrough!
Fourth Level of Liberation!
“Hahahaha!” Letting out a burst of uproarious laughter, Virus was jovial as he looked forward to the rest of his hunting journey.
“Would you look at that, even the way he laughs feels so nice!”
“Wow, bro, look at that face though, he’s definitely selling for a high price! A living treasure!”
Interrupted all of a sudden, Virus’ chuckle vanished as he looked in the direction of the two voices that had interrupted his celebration time.
During the past two days, Virus had encountered a few people and even groups busy hunting monstrous beasts at the vicinity of the border of Chao Mundi.
However, they had been all minding their own business, therefore, Virus did the same and didn’t care about any of them. But now, from their conversation, Virus knew a group of hostile people had arrived.
Thus, looking at them, he saw around ten people led by two on horses strolling toward him.
What garnered his attention the most about this group, however, was their insanely huge physiques. Each and every one of them was at least three meters and they had been bulked up to the brim!
According to the books Virus had read at the library of the Silver Sky Sect, the only people that possessed such qualities were called the barbarians!
“But damn! What merchandise! That face even makes me want to have a go at him, now let’s not talk about those old haggard women at the slave auction house! They would pay a fortune for him!” The bald one among the two horsemen said toward the other rider who was clearly the true leader. Even their horses were of gigantic proportions.
“…” Virus remained silent, wanting to see where they were going with this. Up to this point, he noticed that they were probably slave traders that had come to the Chao Mundi in order to kidnap people.
“Not only that, it looks like he just broke through to the fourth level of Qi Circulation, which makes him even more expensive!” The bald one added.
By ‘Qi Circulation’, the bald barbarian meant the ‘Liberation’ stage.
In the Cultivation Multiverse of Qi, the first two stages had differing names compared to the multiversal name the technological multiverse of the future had come up with.
Here, the first stage, aka Energy Disentanglement, was called the Qi Passage Opening stage while the second stage, Liberation, was instead named the Qi Circulation stage.
However, from the third stage onwards, denoting Sublimity Emergence, the cultivation stage names were the same in both multiverses since the technological human beings of the future had deemed it unnecessary to rename them to a multiversal one. They thought their original names do indeed fit quite well in any multiverse!
“Boss, let me handle him.” At this point, the barbarian standing at the very end of the group stepped up, volunteering for catching and immobilizing Virus.
Evident from his cultivation at the Fourth Level of Liberation, it was obvious he was the weakest amongst the group and now that he had found someone at the same stage as him, he wanted to fight Virus himself in order to elevate and cement his position in the group.
“Ohhh! So our weakest newbie wants to prove himself, huh?” The bald barbarian said with a smirk while gazing at the leader, awaiting his response.
“Sure.” Was the leading barbarian’s answer.
Listening to the confirmation, the newbie barbarian reached his back and grabbed the enormous ax attached to himself as a triumphant smile crept over his face. He could already imagine hacking Virus into two equal separate parts!
SLAP!
“You idiot! We want him alive!” However, he felt an abrupt slap to the back of his neck, reminding him not to use his ax.
“Ah, I see. Okay!” Placing the ax on his back again, he charged in Virus’ direction with no delay!
Patiently studying the incoming assailant, Virus remained expressionless and merely connected to his ring and transmitted a command.
‘Trigger Initial Configuration – Longsword!’
At once, his longsword, ‘The Darkest Night, The Shining Moon’, materialized.
“Ohhhh, he has a treasure too! We hit a jackpot!” The bald barbarian voiced watching the pitch-black longsword that was giving off a blue hue.
“AHHHH!” Meanwhile, the enormous minion had gone into a grappling pose as he run toward Virus.
Swish!
When he was just upon Virus, however, he suddenly stopped.
That made the bald man question, “Oy, oy, oy! Why did you stop!? Grab-“
Unfortunately, before he could even finish, he witnessed the frozen barbarian’s body get separated into two equal vertical parts as it fell on the ground!
“…”
“…”
“What the…”
Silence descended upon the group of barbarians while their eyeballs were already about to pop out of their eye sockets as they gaped at all the internal organs that had spilled out from their comrade’s two body segments!
They could not believe what had just occurred. Since none of them had seen Virus’ slash due to the newbie’s gigantic physique covering their line of sight, they felt stupefied at such an extreme turn of events.
The leader’s face had gone very dark at this point as he stared at Virus with clear venom in his gaze while the bald barbarian’s face had gone ashen white as he looked at his boss and said, “Bro, let me murder that bastard! He dared kill one of us!”
To that, the commander replied, “Go! Capture him if you can, if not, just kill him and let us drink his blood in our newbie’s funeral. That wouldn’t feel so bad as well.”
“Understood! Heeyah!” Seizing his great ax from his back which happened to be even bigger than the ax of the killed subordinate, the bald barbarian charged at Virus on top of his horse!
NEIGH~
Clip-clop! Clip-clop~
Soon, the massive mount was already upon Virus as energy began to spill and gather on the bald barbarian’s ax and arm as he hacked it right at Virus’ head.
It was clear he had no intentions of wanting to capture Virus alive. All he wanted was to take revenge for his lost comrade!
Just as the ax was about to land on his head, Virus dodged doing a side jump using his entire body before landing on a different corner.
‘Sixth level of Liberation!’ Virus determined.
On the other side, getting off the horse, the barbarian sprinted toward Virus again, this time on foot.
“DIE!” He screamed as he was upon him again and chopped using his heavy weapon.
Raising his longsword in response, Virus blocked!
BAM!
“Ah…” Astonishingly, Virus realized he had underestimated these barbarians. There mere force put behind that chop had been so great that Virus was certain it could rival someone at the peak of the eighth level of Liberation!
Although his opponent was truly at the sixth level of Liberation, his body strength was truly terrifying. Although it didn’t reach the absurd level of Virus’ own physique which he had achieved after accomplishing True Sixth Level of Corporeal Tempering, it was still something great to take note of!
‘His cultivation level at the sixth level of Liberation plus his body’s natural strength makes him as strong as someone at the very peak of the eighth level of Liberation.’ He calculated internally.
Beside him, the hairless barbarian’s eyes had long gone wide open. He could hardly comprehend that Virus had stopped his full force attack! He was in utter disbelief!
“H-how!?” He shouted in rage while chopping at him again.
Bam!
“How can a little man at the fourth level of Liberation defend against my attack!” Unfortunately for him, his attack was blocked once more.
BOOM!
The barbarian attacked again, but again, the result was the same.
Swish!
At this time, finding an open spot just as he had blocked the ax, Virus parried it before slicing his longsword upwardly.
Slash~
Targh~
“AHHH!” Subsequently, an oversized arm fell on the ground as an agonized shriek reverberated in the area.
“Retreat!” Ordered the boss of the group of barbarians seeing blood gushing out of his closest subordinate’s detached arm. He had never imagined the situation would get this serious!
Simultaneously, having already seized his ax, the barbarian boss ordered, “All of you! Attack after me!”
Getting off his horse at once, the barbarian boss started running toward Virus’ location like a hurricane, his feet were so heavy and powerful that each step left a deep mark on the ground itself.
On the opposite side, looking at their leader about to reach him and sensing the energy gathering on his ax, Virus concluded quickly, ‘The seventh level of Liberation!’
That immediately amazed Virus because due to the usual limitation of the number of pathways, most cultivators could only achieve up to the sixth level of Liberation!
But here it was, someone who had attained the seventh level!
HACK~
Already upon him, the barbarian chief chopped down using all his might!
BOOM!
Barely taking a step back at the final moment, the ax missed Virus before making direct contact with the ground, exploding it into many bits!
Following shortly, a grave and urgent expression took over Virus’ countenance while he spotted a tear on his dress, he had narrowly dodged it this time!
Honestly, the current Virus wasn’t confident he could win against this opponent. A mere calculation from his part stated that the barbarian’s seventh level of Liberation plus his extremely robust body which was perhaps even beyond the previous bald man’s might would result in his opponent’s force at the minimum reaching a whopping peak ninth level of Liberation!
That in addition to all of the other incoming attacker barbarians lowered Virus’ confidence even more!
Now, the leader had stopped underestimating Virus entirely and decided to go all out!
And that put Virus in grave danger!
