Mana 5 Chapter 11 (Patreon)

“Master.” Aurora’s voice woke me, and I lifted my head. I found myself in my inner world. “You’re awake.”

Her hands were on my chest, pumping as much life mana as she could into me.

I helped her, cycling my own mana and letting the life mana flood and restore me. I was glad that Tuomo had chosen to strangle me. If he’d run a sword through me, I would have had a much tougher time staying alive.

Suffocation only quired a spark of life and enough mana to heal myself to survive the near death experience. Now that I was at the fifth rank, my soul was the most important part; my body was just a shell that housed it.

“Thank you Aurora.” I combed my fingers through her golden hair as I rested my forehead on hers. “You saved me. Again.”

“Don’t make it a habit.” I could hear the fear in her voice as she jumped into my lap and wrapped her arms around me.

“Sorry about that. There wasn’t another option.” I hugged her back to see my other three mana beasts waiting their turn. “Come on in, all of you.” I open one of my arms, only to have them all pile onto my throne.

For a moment, I reveled in feeling their warmth on my soul. That brush with death had been far closer than I would have liked. I’d underestimated the lengths Tuomo would go to remove me from Wenxi’s life. But now at least I knew what he was after. He wanted his own niece as his wife.

My nose wrinkled in disgust.

It fit a few more pieces of the puzzle together, though. None of the attacks had gone after Wenxi directly. He was just working to isolate her.

Thinking back to her time in Murdock, I had a feeling it was actually her mother’s attempt at protecting her from Tuomo.

The man was clearly twisted. It took a certain kind of person to choose to kill somebody by strangling them. That was a murder of raw passion and anger.

“How long have I been out?” I asked.

“Less than an hour.” Aurora raised her head up to respond before burrowing back into my chest.

“Any idea what has happened since I’ve been out?”

“Not a clue. We only see if your eyes are open. Your wives haven’t been in the shared soul palace either.” Quinn informed me.

I sighed. “Then we need to go warn them before they arrive back at the Su Family estate.”

Giving the mana beasts one last big hug, I stood up and stepped out of my soul palace. I sent a pulse of mana to call them.

The shared soul space hadn’t changed much. Except for a few more soul palaces now floated over each of my wives’ soul palaces, they had the resources to elevate their mana beasts to the fourth rank now in the immortal world.

It didn’t take more than a minute before the Hua sisters came running. Both of them had been in training at the Orchid Pavilion.

“What’s wrong?”

“Hold on, I think the others are coming.” I felt Thea and Kat join us in the shared soul space.

“Where are Michelle and Celina?” I asked.

“We can’t both meditate; it is dangerous in the woods.” Kat said.

That made sense. Both groups were out on their missions. “So, I have bad news. Tuomo tried to assassinate me, and he was nearly successful. He thinks I’m dead, but I used Aurora to keep me alive.”

All of them looked pissed enough to go on their own murderous rampage, but Kat’s hiss was the scariest of them all.

“Don’t do anything.” I quickly added. Kat’s frown was enough to tell me she’d already figured out multiple ways she wanted to kill Tuomo.

Frowning, she walked over and pulled a flower out of a nearby vase. She tilted her head, slowly plucking each petal away from it. I had a feeling she was imagining they were Tuomo’s limbs.

I continued, letting her have a moment. “Go back to the Su family estate. Meet with Wenxi and Tianxi and ask to remain there and mourn for a time. I need all of you to cultivate for the month and be ready for the shard of the shattered world.”

“Why?” Kat put her hands on her hips. “We should just turn right around and kill Tuomo’s people.”

I sighed. “Tuomo is after Wenxi. It’s all been a long plan to… get her with child.” Even saying it disgusted me. “This obsession that the ancient families have with their bloodline has gone too far.”

“She’s his niece!” Nikki made a face of disgust. “It is one thing for them to mingle root and branch families. There are several degrees of separation. But he wants his niece?”

All of it made my stomach curl. They would do anything to keep their bloodlines strong. Bloodlines meant power, and a loss of power could lead to their downfall, like the Yunpi family.

“It doesn’t matter now. Tell Wenxi and Tianxi of his goal when you visit, though I suspect Tianxi already knows. And tell them I’m alive, but I’m going to stay out of the city for a time. Kat, can you get in touch with Ming Feng? Have her use you to reach me when it is time to go to the fragment of the shattered world.” It wasn’t a time to wallow in my defeat, but to plan for our future.

Kat lifted a bright red eyebrow as she finished off her sixth flower. “You don’t even know where your body will be when you wake up.”

I shrugged. “I’m still alive. The rest I’ll figure out as it comes. And I’ll come back with a vengeance. I may not be able to crush him yet, but Tuomo has seriously underestimated me.”

“Glad he didn’t break your spirit with his attack.” Kat eyed me for a moment before she gave a single nod. “I’ll make sure everything is fine for your return.”

She stood up, petals falling off her lap all over the floor. “I should get back to Michelle. If you hear about an entire area of trees blasting away, that would just be your wife when I tell her you almost died.” Kat chuckled.

I cringed, knowing it probably wasn’t far from the truth. My warrior wife would not take kindly to the threat on my life.

“I should get back too.” Thea kissed me. “Glad you are safe, and thank you for letting us know.”

Both the Hua sisters lingered, squinting their eyes at me. “You could come to the Orchid Pavilion with us. I’m sure the Madam would keep you safe.”

“And I’d owe her another debt. For now, I’ll pass. Let’s see how everything turns out over the next few days, but I’ll keep it as an option.”

Diana kissed my right cheek while Nikki kissed my left. “Take care of yourself.” They said it in unison before fading out.

“Master, you should wake up and take stock of your situation.” Aurora urged me.

She was right. They could be about to burn my body for all I knew.

I walked back to my throne, settling in and shifting out of my soul palace to see just what was in store for me.

***

I woke up, feeling grass on the back of my neck. I paused for a moment, trying to take in the sounds around me. Birds chirped and something big roared in the distance as wind blew through leaves.

A voice spoke, directed at me. “You know, when one of my family’s workers reported there was a live one among the corpses from the prison, I was curious what I’d find.” Knowing the voice, I opened my eyes and looked towards the sound.

Ming Feng leaned against a tree, not far from where I was on the ground. Looking around, there was a pile of corpses nearby.

“Are those all from the prison?”

“No, some are from the city. We dispose of them by placing them in our family’s hunting ground to strengthen the beasts and give them a taste for human flesh.” Ming Feng said casually.

I was waiting for her to crack a smile and laugh at the joke, but it never came.

“Thanks. I guess I owe it to you for pulling me out?” I rubbed at my neck, which felt fine at this point.

“How did you end up there?”

“Tuomo Su had me falsely arrested and then killed me in your prison. Well, he thought he killed me. I faked that, as you can see.” I looked down at my hand, frowning that I was missing my spatial ring.

It hit me on the side of my head. “He didn’t even take it off you.” Ming Feng said, flinging it back at me as if it hadn’t provided the answers she wanted.

“Probably didn’t want any evidence that would point back to him. Especially since he still thinks I’m Jin Family.” I put it back on, grabbing out a jug of water and chugging. Being choked had left a poor taste in my mouth. Literally.

“So what are you going to do?” Ming Feng asked.

“Train my ass off. Go to this shard of the shattered world with you, and hopefully progress to the sixth rank.” I wiped at my mouth as I finished drinking. “What are you going to do? About me, I mean?”

Based on what she’d said, we were currently sitting in her family’s private hunting grounds after all.

She paused, assessing me before she seemed to come to a conclusion. “Nothing. I will report that I checked out the living corpse and call the worker an idiot. You are free to do what you wish. Oh, and no one from my family will be in the hunting grounds for the next month. It is often left alone for long periods of time to build up powerful beasts.”

“Thank you.” I realized what she was offering.

She nodded. “I should probably thank you as well. Seeing you and the way you view relationships has given me much to think about.” She looked around. “Best of luck; I have already lingered too long.”

With that, Ming Feng whipped her hair behind her and shot away from the edge of the forest, where I was left waiting by a pile of corpses sure to bring hungry beasts any minute.

“Well, I might as well start training now.” I cracked my back as I stood up.

I checked my spatial ring. Nothing was missing. I had only lost about a month of cultivation by having to expel the mana crystals in the prison to fake my death. I could live with that.

Never had I been so happy to trust the Hua sisters with our family’s money.

I had a feeling I could make it up quickly in the Feng Family’s hunting grounds.

Rushing into the forest, I let my mana spool out from me and sweep my surroundings. The second it pinged off something in the fifth rank, I changed directions and chased down my prey.

I didn’t activate my bloodline. Instead, I focused on conceptualizing my mana. As I approached a stream, I could feel the beast just below the surface.

I quickly shot out a claw of a kunpeng. It smashed into the water and the crocodile-like beast within it.

The beast thrashed in the water, no longer perfectly blending into the stream’s stony bottom. Without my mana, I never would have spotted it.

Massive teeth-lined jaws opened up, trying to swallow me whole.

Summoning Mei’s power of the void, I made a spear of darkness and stabbed it into the roof of the beast’s mouth.

Blood sprayed into the air, and it clamped down on the spear as it thrashed its head, tossing me to the ground.

I dissolved the spear, rolling away before its jaws slammed shut.

This beast was far easier to injure than the pangolins, but it made up for that with sheer strength. I could defeat it without my bloodlines, and I wanted to. I needed to keep pushing myself and not rely on them.

Water erupted from the stream, forming pressurized drills and slamming into the ground around me as they sought me out.

I used void to blink into the air as those columns of water shot right through the tree that had been behind me.

But instead of chasing me down, the beast sank back into the stream, its head hovering just at the surface. It remained still, staring me down in challenge.

“Is that how it’s going to be?” I summoned my mother’s bonesword before dashing at it again.

Water sprayed into the air as I collided with the beast. In just a blink of an eye, the crocodile and I exchanged several dozen blows before I kicked off its snout and launched myself clear of the water.

Rough scales and its powerful jaws cut into me more than once, but they were shallow wounds. I used Aurora’s life mana to close them as we fought.

The crocodile was in far worse shape. Cuts crisscrossed along its snout and back as my sword cleaved right through its tough scales.

The beast flipped around with a large splash and shot through the water, trying to make an escape.

I was getting tired of the beasts being smart enough to know when to run. But this one I wasn’t about to let get away.

Leaping into the air after it, I materialized a pair of kunpeng wings and glided after it.

The beast swam for about a mile before it stopped and peered behind it. When it didn’t see me, it relaxed.

As I passed above it, my shadow flitted across its eyes. It looked up just as I dissolved my wings and rocketed down with my sword pointed right at it.

A gout of blood shot into the air over my back as I pierced its torso.

The beast thrashed, giving up all defense. It knew it was dying and wanted to take me down in spite.

But it was sloppy. I parried its huge snout with my sword in my right hand while forming another blade of void in my left. I made a deep cut along the folds of its throat.

The stream ran red with its blood. Each time it attacked me, it pumped more of its life into the stream. I only had to stay on the defensive while it bled out.

Soon, it began to sag, slowing as its head collapsed to the bank.

“Phew.” I wiped at my forehead and walked up to it.

As I neared, its eyes snapped open, and it lunged for me in one last attempt to take me down.

Lumi’s ring pulsed, and I didn’t hesitate. I released my mana beast into the mouth of the crocodile. She caught its jaw wide open and prevented it from closing.

“Be careful, Master.” Lumi scolded me as I jumped away, recalling her to her ring.

The crocodile’s mouth snapped shut, and it stumbled to the ground.

This time, I materialized a lance of void and stabbed the base of its head from a distance to insure it was dead.

By the way, it didn’t even twitch as I severed its spine. It was well and truly dead this time. Dissolving the bone spear back into mana.

“Tricky tricky.” I told myself while I used my bonesword to cut into the beast and pull out its core. “Michelle would love this.”

And she would, although all of her rings were full at the moment. In fact, all of my wives’ rings were full. The month at Murdock had allowed them to hunt in the foothills for fifth rank beasts.

Instead, I’d likely use this core to cultivate. But if I snagged the water dragon again, I’d have to save that one for Michelle or I’d never live it down.

Smiling as I tucked away the core, I looked around. The reserve was full of powerful beasts. I could sense fifth rank beasts, and I’d seen a peak fifth rank beast that didn’t appear to be the king of the area.

That meant there were sixth rank beasts, and maybe even a seventh rank in the core of the forest.

I’d have to be careful. I could only handle so much, but I couldn’t help the thrill that went through my body. The danger called to me.

Practically vibrating with fresh energy, I shot deeper into the forest, spooling out my mana again.

It was only a short way when I discovered a lone cave next to a pool of fresh water.

There were no beasts in the water or cave, so I ducked inside, quickly noticing signs that it had been a camp a long time ago.

Tossing down a few of my own things, I pulled out the crocodile corpse from my spatial ring and started to skin the beast. Then I set up a fire to roast it.

Mana beast meat was one of the best sources of mana. While I was here training for the month, I would gorge myself on the meat between hunting and cultivating their cores.

Part of me was happy for the break from all of it. There were no politics, enemies breathing down my neck, or other people for me to worry about. Just me and a forest filled with powerful mana beasts.

As I set up a more permanent roasting spit over the fire to cook the crocodile, more beast came within my senses, so I darted out of the cave and quickly killed two fourth rank beasts.

As I brought them back to the cave, I felt a swell of accomplishment. This place really was a paradise, there were so many high-ranking beasts. I removed their cores and stored their corpses in my spatial ring.

The crocodile wasn’t even finished cooking when I’d returned, so I started rotating the spit, sprinkling spices on the juicy meat.

Given the size of the creature, I was going to be eating this for a while. If it attracted other beasts, it was likely I was going to be killing far more than I could eat in a single sitting.

And I planned to hunt quite a bit. I hoped Ming Feng wouldn’t get in trouble with her family or be outraged at the number of beasts I slayed, but I had every intention of devouring all the resources the forest would allow me to. This was the opportunity I needed.