Fates Parallel Chapter 413 - Culmination (Patreon)

Yoshika was used to taking command in combat, but in a fight like this one, there was no time to bark orders or formulate strategies. Her bodies moved as one, and she could only trust her allies to follow her lead.

Jia and Eui were an obvious pair—they’d been working in tandem for as long as they’d been cultivating, and their fighting styles complimented each other perfectly.

Yoshika had already learned from her experience against Longyan that Kaede and Meili didn’t work well together. Meili combined many of Jia and Eui’s abilities, but in the end that made her more of a flexible generalist that lacked the specialized traits of either. Kaede, on the other hand, was an extremely aggressive fighter.

Her typical style revolved around reducing her weight to give herself superlative speed and reduce the impact of enemy attacks, then flipping that at the moment of impact to stand her ground and magnify the power of her own strikes. It was a dueling style that was nearly unbeatable against fellow martial artists, but struggled against magical fighters like Yan De.

Meili didn’t have anything in her repertoire that could support a style like that.

Instead, Yoshika paired Meili with Master Ienaga and Kaede with Zheng Long. Zheng wasn’t at full strength, and his fire affinity made him a poor choice for offensive action against Yan De’s oppressive flames. Instead, he would be Kaede’s shield, shoring up her weakness in magical defense.

Yan De was quick to prove himself as the creator of the orthodox style that the Awakening Dragon Sect practiced. His fiery draconic avatar lashed out with tooth, claw, and tail, moving faster than seemed possible for something so huge. The tail whipped around and struck Ienaga with such force that it left a molten crater behind her.

She blocked the strike with her sword, barely protecting Meili from the force while Meili in turn used her own Awakening Dragon technique to guard against the fiery heat.

At the same time, Yan De belched a billowing gout of flame down upon Zheng Long and Kaede while swiping at Jia and Eui with an enormous clawed hand.

Yan De’s flames were more than mere Fire essence. They were solid and weighty, and carried the full power of his domain. They were the all-consuming essence of his ambition, consuming everything before him and adding to his strength.

Yoshika put everything she had into defending herself.

Sacred Art: Lightning God Transformation

Sacred Art: Sixth Arm of Asura—Star Sundering Slash

Jia became a living lightning bolt, and Eui an avatar of destruction. Eui’s slash met Yan De’s mighty claw in a chaotic vortex of mutual annihilation, while Jia attempted to follow up with a blast of purifying Lightning.

Yan De’s assault was stopped, but neither Jia or Eui were able to do any lasting damage. The destroyed arm swiftly regenerated, and Jia’s disruptive lightning showed no signs of slowing him down.

Meanwhile, it was all Zheng Long and Kaede could do to weather the storm of fire that had rained down on them. Zheng Long’s own aura of flame protected them from the worst of it while Kaede spun her blade around with enough raw force to scatter the lingering flames.

Yoshika cursed internally. Even with the Sovereign’s Tear and Master Ienaga on their side, they were still outmatched by Yan De. He wasn’t considered one of the most fearsome men on the continent for nothing.

Weathering his assault wasn’t enough, but there was no way that they could muster enough power to overwhelm him. It was going to take a coordinated assault beyond just splitting into complementary teams. They needed to identify a weakness, create an opening, then strike decisively.

She focused everything she had on the battle—shutting out the rest of the world until there was nothing left but her, Yan De, Master Ienaga, and Zheng Long. She could feel her allies—their worries, their fears, their hopes. Yoshika remembered that she was more than just her aspects. She was Unity itself—she was the spirit of cooperation.

Ienaga Yumi felt Yoshika’s determination welling up within her, and Yoshika felt her master’s pride in turn. Zheng Long understood and shared Yoshika’s worries, but he knew Yan De. The man had been absent as a master, but his techniques and teachings were everything to the Awakening Dragon Sect. He molded the entire sect in his image, and in so doing revealed himself in ways that only the most dedicated students could comprehend.

Students like Zheng Long.

The Awakening of the Dragon’s Heart was a technique that created an aura of flame around the user, which could be solidified into constructs and weapons to wield against one’s foes, or to serve as a shield against attacks. Yan De’s mastery of the technique meant that the entire aura was shield and weapon alike, but it was no true transformation—he was still in there somewhere.

It was a slim chance, but it gave Yoshika something to work with. A chink in the armor that she could target. If they could land a decisive blow against the core of his technique, it might weaken him enough for her to drive him off.

First, they needed to find it. Yan De wasn’t so much of a fool that he would leave his ultimate technique with an obvious weak spot, nor did she think he’d do something as obvious as place himself at the literal heart of the flaming dragon.

Yoshika moved, and without needing to speak, Ienaga and Zheng Long felt her intentions. She’d be relying on them heavily for her plan to work.

She strained with her domain, trying to crush Yan De’s influence and reduce the strength of his aura. Even in the seat of her power, Yan De’s power was overwhelming, but as long as she kept up the effort, he had to match her power with his.

Taking advantage of this momentary distraction, Ienaga let loose with her signature technique.

Sacred Art: Soul Severing Strike

Yan De twisted away, but Yoshika’s partial suppression paid off and a portion of the dragon tail was severed. He took advantage of the opening to counterattack, but Meili and Zheng Long were already in position, combining their own Awakening Dragon techniques to form a flaming barrier.

True to its name, Ienaga Yumi’s Soul Severing Strike sliced a portion of Yan De’s essence away from his soul cleanly, and Yoshika redirected her suppression efforts to only that portion. Unlike Eui’s brutal art, which left nothing behind, Yan De’s essence was unchanged by Yumi’s attack. It was so perfectly severed that it still carried a portion of his intent within it—a tiny microcosm of Yan De’s domain, detached from his will.

Yoshika seized that power, as she had from Yu Meiren, and made it her own. This time, she didn’t bother trying to turn it into something else—it wasn’t meant for her anyway.

She redirected that power to Zheng Long, the fiery divine essence invigorating him in a way he hadn’t experienced since his ascension. For the first time since Yang Qiu’s ambush, he felt a flicker of his former self. Confidence, power, and ambition—he’d modeled himself after the Grandmaster of his sect, but he knew he could never be that person again.

Confidence without strength was just arrogance. Power applied carelessly was just tyranny. Solitary ambition was nothing but selfishness.

Zheng Long did not want to be like the God-Emperor, sitting alone on his lofty throne, so detached from the world that almost nobody alive even knew his face. He didn’t want to be the Grandmaster of Coiling Dragon Peak, meditating in solitude while he neglected his wife and children.

But he’d walked too far down that path to truly abandon it. It tore him apart inside, to know how blind he had been to his own folly. To know that there was no path left to him that he didn’t resent.

He channeled that rage and self-hatred into a single determined act of defiance. Against Yan De, against his destiny, against his own path. Yue would never love him, and Han Yu would never understand his choice—Zheng Long would fight for them regardless.

Sacred Art: Course of the Flaming Heart

Zheng Long’s fiery wings expanded into countless tendrils, erupting forth to wrap around Yan De’s draconic image. The grandmaster tore and snapped at the tendrils, but they were relentless.

Yoshika and Master Ienaga moved swiftly to take advantage of the opening, knowing it wouldn’t last long.

The dantian—Zheng Long’s insight resonated within their souls. Yan De was the very picture of an orthodox cultivator. He abandoned the course of his heart for power, and it was the source of that power that he would put above all others.

Kaede was first, dashing forward with the superlative speed of her Weightless Fist. She had no sacred arts, but her strike carried the weight of the world behind it as she focused her power until the earth cracked beneath her feet.

The blow landed on the fiery dragon’s belly with explosive force, tearing open a wound that bled liquid fire. The concentrated essence of divine flame was too much for Kaede’s hastily constructed avatar to withstand, and it consumed her in a conflagration that burned Yoshika down to the core of her soul.

Before he could recover, Eui and Yumi struck in tandem. Master Ienaga’s Soul Severing Strike cut deep into the dragon’s belly, while Eui’s Star Sundering Slash tore the wound wide open, exposing the inner core within.

Yan De floated in the center of the dragon’s dantian, legs crossed and eyes closed in meditation. His serene expression belied the storm of rage Yoshika sensed from his domain. His voice echoed like thunder from the fiery dragon’s lips.

“Cretins! I am Yan De, Grandmaster of the Great Awakening Dragon Sect! I cannot be brought low by petty tricks and stolen power!”

He snapped free of Zheng Long’s restraints and began to regenerate, but Jia threw herself forward, slamming into Yan De’s body with the speed and force of divine lightning. She crashed against an invisible barrier of raw overwhelming force, her body breaking under the strain of her own technique.

“Useless. Do you think yourselves clever, targeting my dantian? My core is no weakness—quite the opposite. Your mistake will be your undoing. My fires will burn until nothing remains of you—body or soul.”

The heat within Yan De’s core was unbearable, even for Jia, but she forced her broken body to stand as the wound closed around her. It wasn’t over yet.

Jia knew she couldn’t land the decisive blow she needed, and she wouldn’t last long in the center of Yan De’s flaming core, but she could buy time. She dug deep into her soul to draw up the bubbling essence of spite and stubbornness that had served her in the times before she’d met Eui, and after she’d left Jung. When she’d been alone and scared, and the only thing she could do was keep trudging forward out of sheer determination.

She unleashed those emotions, channeling them into her very first spiritual art—one that had fallen out of favor as the enemies she faced grew more powerful, and the scale of her battles became more grand. A technique that opposed the purifying essence of lightning she usually represented.

Sacred Art: Corruption of the Fetid Bog

Jia’s avatar radiated an aura of festering decay, interfering with Yan De’s attempts at regeneration. She grinned with spiteful glee at the grimace of discomfort on his face before her avatar melted under the power of her own technique.

Yoshika resolved to develop proper bodies for herself if she survived long enough. Her hastily constructed avatars couldn’t handle the power of divine essence well.

Putting that thought aside, Yoshika prepared her last resort. Her last avatar, the one that represented her in totality, yet had also become an aspect in her own right. Li Meili floated into the air, gathering essence around her in a vortex so dense it almost became visible to the naked eye.

Meili knew she would only have one chance. Her skill set was a bad match against Yan De. Her most powerful techniques were all Fire aligned to at least some degree, and he was a man who had taken his mastery of fire to a level she would never be able to match. He had already shrugged off her best attacks and hurt her in ways that dealt lasting damage.

He was too strong for her to defeat, but there was one option that might at least be able to injure him. A gift given to Yoshika by Yan Yue, ironically, with the same origin as her father's power.

Meili didn't have Jia's speed and precision, or Eui's unstoppable destructive power, but what she did have was the culmination of everything that made them who they were, good and bad. Their knowledge was hers—their faults and flaws, but also their skills and talents. She might not be able to match their specialties, but she could strike a balance between them that neither could match alone.

She could already feel the power burning in her chest, aching for release, but she held on, letting it build for as long as she could manage. There would only be one chance—she’d put everything she had into creating it, and her allies had put their faith in that opportunity. She refused to waste it.

Yan De’s wound began to close around his core as he shook off the effects of Jia’s last attack. Meili focused every last mote of essence within her to a single point until it welled up from her chest to her throat until she couldn’t hold it back any longer.

The power tore free of her in a voiceless scream that resounded throughout her entire soul realm.

Divine Art: True Awakening of the Dragon’s Heart

A concentrated beam of divine Plasma essence pierced Yan De’s core and obliterated the body of essence within. From the point of impact, the dragon construct disintegrated in a flash of multi-colored flames.

Yan De wasn’t dead, but he’d been dealt a blow too severe to ignore. Yoshika didn’t even have to eject him herself—he fled of his own accord, his domain withdrawing entirely from her soul realm.