39 Book 2: Chapter 10 – Battle Qi

It was at that moment that the beast suddenly sprang into action. Its beautiful silver wings whistled through the air intercepting the sword aiming for its neck.

Despite knowing that she would come out on the losing end in a match of brute strength, Hysode didn't bat so much as an eyelid at the incoming silver-scaled wing.

Ace, who could only barely follow their movements with the help of his [observation], thought Venerin's disciple was about to be sent flying, when her sword suddenly seemed to come to life.

'One with the sword.' Ace noted to himself as he saw the incredible control she had over her sword.

After leaving nothing but a mere afterimage for the silver-scaled wing to slice through, Hysode's sword elegantly arced through the air at a speed that Ace couldn't follow even with his [observation].

As the blade and scaled neck made contact, Hysode raised an eyebrow at the sight of her blade failing to leave so much as a mark, other than the white line that quickly dissipated.

In response, the dragon seemed to smirk at its opponents' futile attempts. As it exhaled, silvery-white plumes escaped the corner of its mouth, causing Hysode's eyes to bulge.

"ROOAAARRRR!"

As the silvery-white flames left its mouth, Hysode once again moved like the wind, barely dodging the dragon's breath.

She was so focused on dodging, Hysode completely forgot that it was her subordinates to her rear. Her heart threatened to beat out of her chest as she watched the scorching white flames shooting towards her fellow soldiers.

But even as the flames neared and their armours began to melt, the soldiers remained steadfast. They showed no fear, despite knowing that their deaths were rapidly approaching. But luckily, when the flames were under a meter away, a purple ball of thunder came out of nowhere to intercept it.

Though most were too slow to react to an attack like that, Wukong wasn't like most people. As soon as the white plumes escaped the dragon's mouth, Wukong reacted by casually summoning a ball of lightning to destroy the dragon's attack.

But how could the casual attack of a rank-six beast compare to the attack of a rank-eight lightning mage? Even if it was a dragon, Wukong's talent was no inferior to Ace's.

As the two attacks met, it took all but the briefest of moments for it to destroy the dragon's fire breath and continue on towards the enemy's army.

Though it didn't care about the lives of the weaker magical beasts that made up its forces, if the black dragon allowed Wukong's attack to hit, it would be a stain on his pride.

With a casual swipe of its giant tail, Wukong's lightning ball was dispersed. It then turned its attention back to Wukong, who had his arms raised.

"My bad, I was in such a hurry to protect my men that I failed to control my strength properly."

"Consider this your first and last warning. If anything like that happens again, I'll be the one to attack!" The dragon growled threateningly.

Ace looked back from the dragon to Wukong in awe. Though it didn't look like much, Ace could sense from the energy in Wukong's spell that it wasn't much weaker than the average attack of Whitebeard.

'This world is definitely a lot stronger than my last.' Ace sighed.

Hysode was thankful for Wukong's interference. Had the dragon's breath landed, even if she did go on to win her fight, she still would've been riddled with guilt.

Her eyes frosted over as she glared daggers at her opponent.

Once again, Hysode's body turned into a blur as it approached the dragon, but it was no slouch. As soon as she entered its range, the dragon's tail sliced through the air like a whip, aiming to turn her head to a pulp.

The young general calmly leant back, allowing the tail to pass over her, just millimetres above her nose.

The silver dragon continued its flurry of attacks, trying to prevent its opponent from getting too close, but no matter what it tried, Hysode was ready. She elegantly danced around the dragon's body, dodging each of its attacks. Whether it was its teeth, tail, or even the occasional dragon breath, Hysode dodged with incredible ease and grace.

It appeared to be a stalemate. The dragon couldn't land an attack, and Hysode couldn't get close enough to attack one of its weak points.

As the dragon's tail pierced towards her, for what felt like the hundredth time, Hysode once again calmly evaded it, but this time, before it could completely retract its tail, Hysode's sword exploded into action.

It was at that moment that Ace understood the meaning behind the name "Silverlight." Though it was too fast to get a proper look, Hysode left a flashing silver light in the air as her sword arced towards its target.

"ROAARRR!"

As the dragon's pained roar threatened to shatter the eardrums of many of the soldiers, Ace watched as the end of its tail fell to the floor, cleanly cut from the rest of its appendage.

"So you finally allowed her to cultivate her battle qi?" Wukong asked, turning to the City lord who stood beside him.

"Only after she broke through to the sixth rank naturally," Venerin replied with a hint of pride. "Unfortunately, that was her limit."

Ace, who'd spent the last several months travelling with Wukong, was no longer the ignorant child he once was.

Wukong had already explained that the [Qi Building Stance] he was taught back in Wushan Town was the simplest of all body tempering methods as it only allowed you to absorb the neutral essence of heaven and earth, which only appeared as the sun rose in the morning. In contrast, others allowed warriors to absorb the elemental essence in the atmosphere like mages; only, it was used as fuel for the body instead of being turned into mageforce to fuel a mage's spells.

That being said, the biggest difference between the [Qi Building Stance] and the other body tempering techniques was "battle qi." Battle qi was a form of energy used to strengthen physical attacks and was stored in a fist-sized container located just beneath the navel, but the only form of essence that could be turned into battle qi was elemental essence.

But what still made the [Qi Building Stance] so popular was that as the energy absorbed using the [Qi Building Stance] couldn't be stored in the Qi vassal below the navel, all the energy absorbed was used to temper the body, meaning that the bodies of those who used the [Qi Building Stance] tended to be stronger than other warriors at the same rank.

Unfortunately, the further you progressed using the [Qi Building Stance], the harder it was to continue.

The average warrior will reach their limits at the peak of the third rank. Those who were able to reach the fourth rank were all elite-level talents, and it was said that unless you were a descendant of the four supreme warriors, it was impossible to surpass the peak of the sixth rank, but all who made it that far were prodigies usually only seen once every hundred years.

Although Hysode didn't make it to the peak of the sixth rank, the fact that she made it to the sixth rank at all spoke volumes of her talent.

Ace and the others watched with their eyes peeled as Hysode refused to give the dragon a chance to breathe. Its slip in concentration due to pain gave Hysode her opportunity to finally close the distance between them.

Even though she was moving too fast for Ace to follow, with the help of his [Observation], Ace was able to catch the briefest of glimpses of her blade, allowing him to see the sharp, silver aura coating it.

When Ace first heard that you needed to absorb elemental essences to cultivate Battle Qi, he assumed that his lack of elemental affinity would hinder him, but Wukong told him that unlike the ways of a mage, the warrior training manuals didn't rely on affinity.

They allowed anyone to forcibly absorb the essence of any element, regardless of one's affinity but having a higher affinity did make it easier to absorb the essence of that element.

'I can't wait till I get to cultivate my Battle Qi,' Ace thought to himself with a sigh.

The increase in power was incredible. Hysode, who was previously unable to leave so much as a dent in the dragon's seemingly impenetrable scales, was now able to draw blood with each slash.

The power and speed of her attacks weren't the only things to see an increase; even her movement speed spiked as she used her battle qi to strengthen her legs.

Ace couldn't see the heroic young woman at all by that point. All he could see was the dragon's attacks becoming increasingly frantic as it angrily tried to destroy the annoying ant before it, but Hysode refused to back down.

Hysode's domineering performance lit a fire of hope in the rest of the army as they watched their young general completely control the flow of the battle.

Unfortunately, Venerin didn't share their optimism. He watched with his fists clenched so tight the cracking of his knuckles could be heard by everyone around him.

As her master, he knew that since she had only just begun cultivating her battle qi, although it gave her a drastic increase in power, her qi reserves would soon run dry. All he could do was pray she could finish it before that.

Thankfully, Hysode wasn't the only one who was slowly weakening. With each blow it suffered and attack it released, the dragon's stamina also waned. But unlike Hysode, it wasn't able to keep its composure.

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P.atreon.com/AceInCoilingDragon: Book 2 - Chapter 20