CHAPTER 43: CHAPTER 43: WAR PATH PT8 — MELENA THE ILLUSION QUEEN

Yuan’s body soared through the air as his eyes remained closed and he hit the ground with a thud—his body laid there, putting Cheng and Marquis on the edge—they knew defeating him wouldn’t be that easy, because if it were, Marquis would’ve ended the fight by himself.

Yuan’s heart skipped a beat—the blood in his veins accelerated and a greenlight covered his body. The wound that Cheng had delivered closed itself and he opened his eyes before getting back to his feet.

Silently, he clasped his hands together and the terrain reformed—massive roots emerged from under the ground forcing Cheng and Marquis to evade the growing roots. Once the roots were fully grown, Yuan dropped a golden seed into the root beside him and the pandemonium began.

The surface of the roots with flower buds wiggled and opened releasing golden pollen in the air—the pollen served as a debilitating effect that sapped Neuro-Qi from anything it touched—though it served as a secondary assault as the primary one appeared shortly after the pollen, the flower buds fully open released a multitude of Yuan’s surrounding Cheng and Marquis.

The two felt the debilitating effects of the pollen as they felt their Neuro-Qi starting to fade—and with the multiple of Yuans there, they knew one thing, they were on a timer and Yuan was going the battle of attrition route, to outlast them.

The Yuans attacked moving at neckbreaking speeds as they swarmed Marquis and Cheng respectively.

Marquis called on the three other pillars and started blasting a myriad of lasers through the swarming army—explosions from his attacks reached the sky but the longer he stayed within the pollen, the less powerful his suit got, as the primary energy source powering it up was getting drained—and to make matters worse, the Yuans were not easing up on their assaults, each 100 he destroyed 300 more take their place.

Marquis let out a frustrated sigh and looked at Cheng.

Cheng too was on the backfoot—his weapons were losing their structure the longer he stood in the pollen, and his attacks were ineffective in dealing with the Yuans as they kept on multiplying the more he destroys.

Before they knew it, they were back to back facing the swarm.

Marquis breathed heavily—keeping up the suit and his own cultivation skill within the pollen was taking a massive toll on him. He blasted the few Yuans who got close and looked behind him at Cheng. "Fairing any better?"

Cheng swiped the air with his made trident and destroyed the Yuans coming at him. He shook his head at the question. "Not at all... The pollen is tapping too much into my energy, I can’t call upon it in its fullest potential."

Marquis looked at the sky—his head running through millions of probabilities of making it out of the situation they were in. "I have a plan, but you’ll have to handle a majority of this alone."

Cheng nodded—in situations like this, he had to have absolute faith in his comrades. "Leave it to me." He said as he conjured up more golden weapons with his ability.

Cheng heard Marquis take off, and he grinned facing the overwhelming force alone. "Come at me!" He charged at the group in his line of sight, his helbergs and other weaponry made from the forge on his back coming to play—he cut through the first line of defense, rushing to the center while destroying the clones—occasionally he would get hit by a stray attack, a branch that pierced through his side and a decline in energy but his heroic spirit burned brighter.

Marquis hovered above the cloud of pollen—his suit flared to life as the Neuro-Qi level started to rise. He detached the wings and combined them with the pillars and reshaped how they looked turning them into a massive fan.

Redirect all power to the pillars

Maximum throttle on the thrusters

The thrusters bursted with life as the blades on the wings rapidly rotated creating a massive gale which blew downward pushing away the pollen from the center.

Cheng glanced up—the man was a genius second to Tiang’s daughter, his quick-witted thinking gave them a fighting chance against the monstrosity. With his energy not tempered with—Cheng slammed his hands together, now he could let loose.

ZEUS FORGE

Multiple golden circles opened behind him, illuminating the entire forest—a bombardment of weapons created from the gates flooded the battlefield, piercing through the clones, cutting them down in rapid succession.

Yuan palmed the ground and a huge tree sprouted from where he was—the tree towered over the mountains and he merged with it—the vines under his control flared up and wrapped around Cheng’s hands and feet, pinning the man down while absorbing his life force. The same thing happened to Marquis, and this brought an end to their fighting chance.

When all hope seemed lost, a thread of silver appeared.

Pink boots glided to a stop on one of the roots and their owner grinned as she looked at the restrained men—her blue eyes gleaming with excitement hidden by her massive pink hat with feathers on it. Melena chuckled. "Grigory, I never pictured you as a fighter."

Marquis opened his eyes briefly—he looked at Melena and a weak smile appeared on his face. "You could...make it."

"Of course, after all you need a woman to save you." She puffed her chest triumphantly—Melena looked at Cheng and a coy chuckle left her lips. "You too Cheng? How pitiful are you men."

Cheng internally groaned—the one person he did not need to meet, had come to their rescue. I’m not seeing tomorrow after this. He silently sobbed, even as a powerful man he is, the woman in question knew how to ragebait him.

Melena’s carefree attitude disappeared as she looked at the massive tree in the distance—she quickly deduced the effects of the tree and its significance to the situation at hand. Melena walked a couple of steps forward, her eyes set on the figure within the tree and she opened her arms.

DREAM CAST

Neuro-Qi flowed in waves within her conduits and outside—a pink sphere appeared in her hands. The sphere released pink flower pedals and in a flash, the color pink had overwhelmed everything—gone were the ice covered mountain tops and the destroyed ground, the entire battlefield had shifted to a world made from pink cutton candy with random dilapidated buildings in the distance.

Melena’s eyes glowed as she levitated, her cloak unhooking itself from her neck and it flew alongside her as if it had gained sentience.

The vines wrapped around Cheng and Marquis collapsed from her command freeing the two and her cloak expanded to cover the two men—it returned some of the life force they had lost at the behest of the tree.

Yuan’s face darkened when he saw this—he roared and commanded his vines to attack Melena.

But what he didn’t expect happened.

The vines?

They turned to flowers.