‘Hmm. As easy as it might seem, I don’t want to engage in direct combat with these late-stage Spirit Refiners.’
Aksai thought to himself, maintaining a neutral gaze as he assessed his opponents.
Aksai believed in overpowering his enemies using all the advantages he possessed. He preferred to avoid prolonged battles unless absolutely necessary.
Moreover, Spirit cultivators were notorious for their arsenal of tricks and techniques. Aksai understood that while he could gauge his opponents’ combat skills, he couldn’t underestimate the hidden trump cards they might possess.
Deciding to change the dynamics of the encounter, Aksai smiled at Aria and Darius before speaking calmly.
“Who said I was running away from you? I merely sought to create distance to avoid endangering my allies,” he explained, summoning four of his Scarecrow Fiends from the Everwood farm.
The Scarecrow Fiends emitted menacing screeches as they appeared, surrounding Aria and Darius and cutting off their escape routes.
The very presence of the Scarecrow Fiends was menacing. It sent shivers down the spines of both Darius and Aria.
“Four powerful puppets simultaneously? How is this possible? What kind of puppetry art is this?”
Aria questioned Darius, her heart filled with apprehension, hoping he could identify their weaknesses.
Unfortunately, Darius had no reassuring answers.
“A swordsman and a puppeteer? Seems we’ve bitten off more than we can chew,” he responded, retrieving various defensive and offensive talismans from his storage ring. He also took out a defensive artifact he had.
Following suit, Aria did the same.
Aria did the same. Both of them were late-stage Spirit cultivators. Just like Aksai, they too had many life-saving treasures at their disposal.
Aksai had used the element of surprise and his explosive martial arts to dispose of Thorn before the latter could make use of the tools available to him. However, they were not in the same boat as their departed ally.
Both Aria and Darius realized that it wasn’t them planning to outnumber Aksai, but Aksai who had decided to outnumber them using his puppets. A brutal fight awaited them while Aksai watched from a distance.
The small space above the Dadangar sea water turned restless as Aria and Darius fought for their lives.
Both unleashed various Spirit spells to deal with Aksai’s puppets and attempted to attack Aksai himself.
Some of their attacks landed on Aksai as well, but they failed to deal critical damage.
The water surface kept rippling, and small waves were erected before dying down as the battle raged on.
***
A few minutes later… The battle between Aria and Darius versus Aksai’s Scarecrow Fiends came to an end.
Aksai had lost two of his Scarecrow fiends due to the talismans and artifacts Aria and Darius had used on the puppets.
On the other hand, Aksai retrieved the storage rings of the two enemies he had just eliminated. Aksai couldn’t retrieve the bodies of Aria and Darius because they were mangled and destroyed beyond recognition by the ferocious attacks of his Scarecrow Fiends.
As such, he just let the sea claim the bodies of his two enemies.
Aksai’s long robe didn’t survive his continuous fights with the three opponents. His muscular physique was on full display, with many light wounds on his body from which his blood leaked. There was also blood of his opponents smudged on his torso and back.
Aksai decided not to clean up after himself. He needed to put on an act that fighting with the three opponents back-to-back had really taken a toll on him, putting him in a precarious condition.
This was so that nobody would expect anything else from him after he started co-owning the spirit vein island in the future.
***
A few minutes later, Aksai returned to the sight of the half-destroyed ship.
Jumping down from his flying sword, he landed on the ship’s deck once again and realized that his side had indeed won.
However, the victory had come at a cost.
Jamon Jaram, Nimiya’s husband, had died in the battle against Kaelen’s subordinates.
He had managed to save his wife but ended up being dealt a life-threatening injury at a critical moment.
The taste of the victory was bittersweet. Aksai watched Nimiya crying and allowed her to let her emotions pour out.
Aksai’s remaining allies weren’t in better shape either. They had barely managed to defeat their opponents using teamwork.
Nobody had expected Aksai to survive the battle after they saw both Aria and Darius run after him.
So when Aksai returned in his bloody form, they couldn’t tell if they felt relief or some kind of wariness towards him.
“Kaelen is dead,” Nuya stepped forward and greeted Aksai with a somewhat difficult smile on her face.
In the next moment, she took out Kaelen’s severed head from her storage ring and threw it in front of Aksai and all her allies.
It seemed that she too had just returned to the ruined ship. She looked like she had fared better against her opponent.
However, Aksai could tell that she was only pretending. Nuya had obviously suffered in her fight against Kaelen all by herself a lot but wanted to keep up pretenses to maintain her image as the leader of the group.
“What now?” Aksai asked as he looked at Kaelen’s severed head with a blank expression.
“We head towards Emerald Cove,” Nuya spoke with determination as she looked at her allies with solemn expressions.
“I know that all of you are tired. Nimiya, I know that you need to grieve your husband’s death. But we can’t stop now.
The battle was a lot tougher than we had expected it to be but thanks to this, we would also have an easier time dealing with the remnant forces of Kaelen that are back on Emerald Cove.
If we want to take ownership of the island, now’s our best chance. As such, I would request all of you to follow me.”
Nuya said before taking control of the Array Formations on the ship. She used some talismans to temporarily fix the ship’s Formation and let it speed towards Emerald Cove at a steady pace.
‘Haah! Just a little bit of wait before I get to have a place I can call home in this world once again.’
Aksai thought to himself as he stood calmly at the front of the speeding ship, feeling the salty wind in his hair.