Desperate Struggle

"Are you the one who murdered my Xia?!" Seeing a figure in black clothing appear before him, the city lord asked. His voice contained endless waves of anger.

Blade not bothering to put on his mask, the city lord didn't know if this person was a friend or foe, it seemed he was still calm enough to speak with.

"I sent him to the otherworld so technically he isn't dead... Well, unless there isn't an otherworld and he is dead." Suddenly saying this, Blade even confused himself.

He began thinking about it. While he was busy thinking about if there was or if there wasn't, the city lord's anger shot through the roof, reaching unsafe levels.

He couldn't hold back his anger. Rushing toward Blade's location, he forgot his army, forgot his caution, forgot everything, in his mind... Kill!

Kill! Kill! Kill!

In front of him was a young man. He had dashing looks but the city lord didn't perceive it. All he saw was the killer of his son and the utter casualness.

He was driven to the brink of insanity. He didn't care about his body and burst forth with strength that would normally never have been used.

This strength was aimed at the boy who killed the only remaining light in his life. Bellowing out loudly, he unsheathed a demonic-looking katana from his waist.

Crossing a distance of tens of meters in an instant, his body was enveloped in flames as his anger continued to rise.

The murder of his son just stood in the air, finger on chin, deep in thought. No worry about the incoming attack, he didn't place the city lord in his eyes.

No words were shared from there. The city lord's sword tore apart the wind and came slashing toward the young boy.

In the face of this, the boy simply glanced at the city lord for a moment before turning into a blur and reappearing in front of the city lord.

Placing his hand on the city lord's shoulder, the city lord, Peng clan's leader realized that his body didn't move. He couldn't move. He couldn't shake off the boy's grip!

"W-What!"

The city lord was shocked. There wasn't anything to say. It didn't make sense. He, a Martial Lord couldn't escape the grasp of a boy who didn't seem to be twenty yet.

Even the flames enveloping his body didn't affect the young boy's hand. It seemed as if the flames didn't touch the boy's skin, he didn't flinch even a little.

"I was thinking. I still am. So stay put until I've finished thinking... okay?" Blade kindly smiled and released his grip.

'Well, if this treasure could absorb the souls of those I kill, it means lifeforms do have souls and physical attacks are unable to destroy it, meaning all the people I've killed can still revive?'

"Damn..."

'But, this wouldn't make sense right? Wouldn't there be at least one person to have retained life or... Wait, Evil Spirits, they're probably the souls of the dead, but then shouldn't there be more? Maybe the good souls are somewhere else, like heaven or something... Anyway, about this guy.'

Blade's attention turned to the city lord who had pulled back and created a distance between the two as he regrouped with his army.

"Heavenly Dragon Formation...!"

The city lord shouted as his army suddenly drew out their weapons and assembled into a formation facing Blade.

All of their auras seemed to fuse and grow, taking physical form as Blade soon lost sight of their bodies which were seemingly inside of a newly appeared green dragon!

At the center of its forehead, the city lord stood with his katana in hand, gripped tightly he pointed at Blade's figure before the dragon flashed across the distance between them and Blade.

Instantly, the city lord attacked once more. This time, his attack was clearly more powerful than the last as Blade's face showed intrigue.

Seeing the sword strike rushing toward him, Blade momentarily froze. Opening his chest, as if welcoming a hug, he then slammed his palms together.

Boom!

A shockwave occurred and when it died down, one could see Blade's palm. Between them was a long curved black blade with red patterns.

"You're strength... It was a little more powerful than the last time... Interesting!"

Seeing the condensing smirk on his face, the city lord grew even more rageful. At the same time, the dragon's massive tail swung through the air like a whip, rushing toward Blade.

Fwoosh!

It parted the winds as Blade let go of the city lord's sword. His space ring flashed with light as he then gripped the sword that just appeared in his palm.

Blade's face darkened for a moment as he felt as if his sword had vibrated and tried to escape his grip but, during a fight, he didn't think much and simply slashed toward the incoming tail...

Bang!

The two attacks collided. At that moment Blade utilized the only technique his master had thought him...

{Freezing Skies: Frost Slash}

Though he didn't have the Ice Law, it didn't mean Ice techniques were useless. It just meant that the strength of these techniques in his hands was weaker than in the hands of an Ice user.

But, in his hands, anything seemed capable of destroying the world. With a slash downward, several arcs of light escaped his sword and rushed toward the tail.

Boom!

With a massive explosion of snow, the tail was instantly turned into a sculpture as Blade rushed toward it and slashed once more, this time with raw strength.

Simultaneously, above his head, a large painting appeared simply levitating over Blade's head.

Whoosh!

In an instant, Blade slashed his sword at the sculpture created from ice. Bang! His sword landed on it and the sculpture of ice exploded into multiple pieces.

The consequence of this action was instantly made clear. As the tail was detached from the main body, it had broken apart into countless fragments, painting the skies in blood.

The blood that tainted the sky red was owned by those who had formed this formation. In a moment of weakness, the city lord had already lost quite a number of his army.

Above Blade's head, the painting released waves of darkness. In this army, each of them was at the level of Great Grand Masters, and their bodies were enveloped by this darkness.

Not stopping here, Blade attacked once more. His sword slashes this time focused on the body of the illusionary Green Dragon.

Arcs of silvery blue light escaped the blade and rushed toward the body in moments, tearing apart anything in its way before exploding upon contact with the body.

Tsk!

"Dammit!" The city lord shouted in anger. In but a few sword attacks, the only thing remaining was the head of the Dragon where he was at.

Moving the head, he, along with a part of his army that had survived and were inside the head didn't wait for Blade to attack them.

Though they were unable to influence the Laws of the world by themselves, with top-class battle techniques only those who entered the army could learn, hundreds of sword strikes rushed toward Blade's figure.

These sword strikes were powerful and radiated intense heat. At the forefront of these streams of attacks was one extremely powerful sword strike that spewed out flames.

Compared to the sword strikes behind it, this one completely dwarfed them all in terms of power and heat. It was red and it raced across the skies like a falling star.

Boom!

An explosion of flames occurred. Without much time to react, Blade had no choice but to take the attack at full force.

The force of the attack and then the explosion sent him flying back. Shockingly, it was possible to push him back. Seeing this, the city lord was momentarily happy as hope had appeared.

Being pushed back a couple of meters, Blade brought himself to a stop. A couple of meters? When the city lord saw this, his expression froze and the hope had immediately been crushed.

"Well done city lord! I didn't expect that you'd be able to exert such power." Blade commended the middle-aged man with a cold smirk.

Yeah, he needed to commend him. That previous attack had managed to burn a strand of his hair.

The only problem was the hundreds of thousands of strands of hair remained perfectly fine and his appearance remained the same.

At this time, the soldiers had already exhausted their energy with that one attack.

Any Martial Lord would have died under such a powerful attack, hence they didn't think twice and used the technique.

With the lone Dragon's head breaking apart and soldiers falling to the ground, the weaker ones unconscious, the Martial Lord Peng clan's leader remained in the skies.

Hah... Hah... Hah!...

The city lord's breaths were heavy. His eyes were sunken and his greeted teeth parted as he proclaimed to an emotionless Blade who had a demonic painting floating above his head.

"Hehe... you think it's over... but, it's only just started...! So what if you're a Pinnacle Martial Lord..!"

Puchi!

Blade's expression showed confusion as the city lord took his sword and embedded it into his own chest but he was soon enlightened as right after, a terrifying bloodthirsty aura permeated the air!