The Fourth Stage - Chapter 9 preview (Patreon)

Wu Ying danced across platforms of fast dispersing air, his form blown from hidden platform to hidden platform. Beneath him, spikes of metal and waves of sand rose up in an attempt to catch the wind cultivator, even as blasts of flame tore through the sky, altering the flow of air and wind alike. All across the dome, formations flared to life and faded, blocking missed blows and attacks.

The wind cultivator was not idle, his sword cutting through the air and sending arcs of blade intent and compressed wind chi. It tore through the air, forcing his opponents to duck aside. However, that was not the only obstacle that his opponents had to navigate. As the air churned from the various chi attacks, small wind devils formed throughout the arena, casting sand and the occasional unlucky cultivator aside.

Wu Ying kept a constant pressure on the sand of the arena at the same time, attempting to cast it into the air once again to block sight. However, this time, Elder Hsu was asserting his own control of the elements, clumping the sand together whenever it interacted with his own attacks. As such, while the air was choked with the granular gravel, it was not to the extent that it was impossible for others to see.

On top of that, Guardian Pang’s blast of overheated fire turned sand to glass and then, moments later those shards of glass would be compressed and formed together, gathering in the center of the arena. A molten river of glass kept forming, though shards of the superheated molten sand flew through the air to be cast aside by reinforced auras.

Even under the attacks of three cultivators, Wu Ying continued speaking, his voice academic and almost bored. “Guardian Pang, your dao is fascinating. Fire elemental attachment of course, but your dao… what is it? Stuffiness? Order? That you can assert it on the molten sand you create, it must be a higher order dao.”

A stifling pressure pushed at his control of the wind and for a moment, Wu Ying wobbled. He nearly fell from the sky as the Guardian pushed upon him, but the issue with higher order dao’s – those that dealt with concepts rather than specific elemental aspects – were their weakness. Greater flexibility but lower strength.

“Oh, no. More restrictive. Your dao isn’t about order, it’s about stopping others, constraining them. Containing the world and elements, so that you can understand it.” Wu Ying twisted and punched, a blast of concentrated wind pushing the ball of glass studded sand aside. It flew away into a nearby cyclone where it was picked up by the wind and thrown at Elder Mo. “How… bland.”

The Elder took a couple of steps forwards, hiding behind a spike of metal and allowing the ball to bypass him. A slight twisting of the dao and elements surrounding them grabbed the ball of glass as it landed and skipped, swamping it in metal and holding it close seconds before another cyclone swept across in an attempt to pick them up.

“Are you intending to just talk, boy? Where is your pride now, all that boasting?” Guardian Pang snarled, holding his hands up. He strained, trying to force Wu Ying down while he flitted back and forth in the sky.

“Oh, I’ll deal with you soon enough,” Wu Ying said. “Elder Mo, your dao… it’s weak. Your core is strong, multi-layered. But your Nascent Soul within, it’s weak. You never nurtured it with much dao understanding, never chose a dao that sat well with who you are. And rather than find another way around, perhaps by choosing a new dao, perhaps rebuilding your body using Body Cultivation, you chose to stay as you were.

“And you feel you need to judge me.”

In answer, a surge of chi erupted from Elder Mo. It twisted the air and pulled at the particles of metal within, coalescing tiny spheres that hung in the air. Thrusting his hand forwards, he utilized the chi that he had filled the arena with to cast the attack at Wu Ying. Dozens of tiny ball bearings flew towards Wu Ying, their greater weight and strength ignoring the pull of the wind.

Sword in hand, Wu Ying darted to the side, targeting one portion of the cloud that came at him. His sword moved in a blur, striking again and again at the spheres and slicing them apart. As they became smaller, they were more easily manipulated. The western wind, dry and amused, took up the separated portions and cast them at Elder Hsu.

A sand wall formed to block the attack, tiny craters forming in the earthen barricade. A couple of tiny portions, flung at such speed and strength that it pierced the barrier peppered the man behind the barrier. He growled, though the attacks were so blunted that they only pitted his reinforced body.

“Boy, are you going to assess me then? Cast aspersions on my journey through immortality?” Elder Hsu said.

“No, I would not do that,” Wu Ying said. “After all, I have respect for you.”

“Good. Because it’s my turn, boy.” Moments after he finished speaking, he leapt, the ground exploding beneath his feet. A cyclone swung in the air, catching at his body but he blasted right through the cyclone barely slowed or shifted from his trajectory.

Wu Ying snorted, drifting sideways. Only to blink, for he realised that even as he shifted away that he was nearing the Elder. Space itself was warping, the distance between himself and the Elder warping and narrowing fsater than his movements.

“Fascinating…” Not holding back for sure. Rather than face his opponent in unarmed combat, Wu Ying lowered the tip of his weapon to target the leaping man. Sword intent gathered at the point, a wind barrier forming around the blade.

To little avail as Elder Hsu battered the weapon aside with one sand reinforced arm. The sharpened edge of the weapon cut through the sand armour into the reinforced skin beneath, the Body Cultivator ignoring the pain and injury to reach for Wu Ying.

Only for his target to spin in mid-air and throw a backkick into the snail-style Elder’s chest. It struck him hard, throwing his opponent backwards even as reaching hand shifted trajectory to grab at Wu Ying’s leg. He clamped down hard the moment contact was made, a sucking pressure exerted from his dao holding flesh-to-flesh.

“I got you now!” Elder Hsu hissed, the pair plummeting as the wind that bore Wu Ying up was unable to carry them both. They fell, even as the molten glass pool formed beneath them shifted to their projected impact point, rolling waves of heat and the smell of burning hair and smoking sand rising to meet them both

As they fell, Elder Hsu moved to wrap the other cultivator in a tight bear grip.

“Not yet,” Wu Ying said.

Before Elder Hsu could understand what he meant, the wind cultivator allowed the portion of his body still held onto by the other to dissipate. At the same time, he released the swirling tornados of current that made up his aura in an explosion of chi, throwing the pair apart.

Catching himself on an updraft, Wu Ying cast himself higher, barely avoiding another gout of fire from the angered Guardian Pang. Then, almost immediately, he had to drop and twist his way through the spray of metal balls that Elder Mo wielded, his sword cutting apart the attacks and dispersing the weaves of chi the Elder used to control the spheres.

“Well, I think that’s enough of that. As Elder Hsu mentioned.” Wu Ying paused, pulsing his aura once to deflect a gout of fire into the metal balls, letting them overheat and then, using that same pulse and heat he wrested control of the spheres and the air around them away to send them to impact the arena walls. “My turn.”

He waited, a heartbeat of a pause, long enough for his word to sink in. Then he looked upwards, drawing the attention of spectators and opponents alike to the sky. So involved had their battle been that the majority had missed what had been occurring high above.

Clouds that had been gathered over a week, whose heavy, watery burden had threatened rainfall but refused to shed their burden had deepened further. The clouds had threatened, like a disappointed parent to a naughty child of a future reckoning, but always, always it had delayed it. Now, final judgment and consideration was due, and the dark omens were all too clear.

Wu Ying was no cloud Daoist. He had no greater understanding of the climate and sky, of the rainclouds and tempest. What he did control was the wind, and he understood well enough that packed together closely enough, clouds turned into rain. It was but a small matter to concentrate the clouds that had formed above them even further. A small thing to allow the cyclone to form, for the spout to rotate ever faster.

Rain came first. Hard, pounding rain that was mixed with sleet and hail. Fat droplets the size of a coin struck the ground, splattering apart and causing steam to rise up. The temperature of the surroundings rose at first, as molten glass and heated air mixed to turn into steam before the continuing deluge cooled and cracked the pool of liquid, glowing sand below. Flames from below rose up to strike at Wu Ying, only to be caught in the guarding sphere around him and then banked by the falling rain. Each moment, the Guardian’s control of the elements fell by the wayside, even as the chaotic nature of nature exerted itself on the surroundings.

Not only was the Guardian the only one to be affected by the falling rain. Fire was banked and diminished, but earth became sodden and clogged, the water seeping into earthen waves and slowing their movement. It required even more chi by Elder Hsu to move the earth around, while the falling rain and the introduction of new chi made the expenditure by Elder Mo in using his spheres even greater.

“Is that it? A little rain?” Guardian Pang snarled. “If you think this is enough…”

“Hush,” Wu Ying said. “As I said, my turn.”

Head turned upwards, his sword hand still moving to cut apart flying metal spheres that threatened to strike him, Wu Ying pulled on the supercell above. The funnel cloud he had concentrated above them reached downwards, linking the sky above to the ground below. Protective formations above the arena flared to life as the tornado end reached it, but they were shredded apart as the competing necessities of stopping fast-moving energy and the need to allow air to flow wore at the formations. In one corner, Wu Ying sensed Elder Wang’s hands moving, his aura extended as he adjusted the formation on the fly to ensure that it was not entirely overburdened.

“Stop him now!” Guardian Pang said, holding both hands out. The wind cultivator was no longer running and so he poured the full strength of his dao and cultivation into the attack, holding Wu Ying still as a bare of concentrated flame shot towards him.

At the same time, Elder Mo released his attack. Hidden beneath the ground, the spikes of metal erupted from the sand, weaves of chi the size of a fist controlling their ascent. As for Elder Hsu, rather than join the attack, the snail elder retreated backwards, forming a bulwark of sand between him and the twister above.

“Too late.” Wu Ying made the pronouncement simply even as he held his hand forth between him and the incoming attacks. Flame roared, striking the still air that he held before him, splashing against hardened air as though it struck a wall.

Gritting his teeth tightly, a hand clenched close, Wu Ying struggled to contain the flame and keep the rotating wall of wind, rotating in just the smallest amount of distance he could control, together. He would not show the strain, battling to keep his visage entirely calm even as the spears, coming from dozens of directions flew up towards him and the Guardian locked him in place.

But the attacks needed long seconds to arrive, and in those moments, the tornado finally touched down. Rotating air arrived in a roar that shook the arena, threw papers and cups and plates of refreshment into the air. Elders hidden behind protective formations suddenly found themselves exposed and forced to expand their own aura to contain the howling winds.

Flame was the first to be caught, twisted and sent high into the sky. The bar of flame wrapped around the column of air, lighting it up from outside as it rotated inwards. The metal spears were next, the tendrils of chi containing the attack torn apart.

Then, finally, his opponents were taken by the tornado. Ripped from the earth, their control over their flight peeled apart by the oppressive wind chi and the dao that Wu Ying had imparted through the attack, they were plucked from the ground and flung upwards to join the spears and flame. Their screams were drowned out by the continual roar of the twister.

Only Wu Ying, floating in a gentle arc around the tornado was left alone.

Higher and higher, the cultivators were drawn into the sky, until the Sect Head’s voice rang out. One word, but with it came an overpowering wave of chi and dao intent.

“Enough.”

As suddenly as it began, the tornado ended. Wind that had been rotating at high speeds stopped, the energy of its movement robbed by the chi that pervaded the surroundings. The pair of cultivators, flung high into the sky found themselves no longer drawn inexorably upwards but instead felt the effects of gravity reasserting itself.

They fell, even as the storm clouds above began to disperse, the energy that had kept them in place, the gentle ministrations of the Dragon’s Breath parted.

Wu Ying, floating and bemused by the sudden change in atmosphere looked towards the source of calm. All his work, all his preparations, wiped clean by a single exertion of will and chi.

Meeting the gaze of the man who had done so, Wu Ying allowed himself to float to the ground to meet his fate.