Chapter 8: Su Ling's First Battle
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It seemed to have sensed the presence of the living. The few monsters closest to Su Ling and the others straightened up, bobbing their heads up and down in the air as if sniffing something out.
Su Ling didn't try to act tough and claim she could handle it. She had a pretty clear idea of where her current strength stood, and she knew that fighting alongside Isha would do nothing but drag the other person down.
Isha, on the other hand, had no such worries. She drew her sword without hesitation and charged straight at the monsters. The sharp tip of the blade traced a perfect silver arc through the air, and in the blink of an eye, a rotting, ugly head was already flying.
So fast!
Su Ling's pupils contracted slightly. She hadn't even caught the motion of Isha's swing. The other person's speed had blown past the limits of her current dynamic vision, which just went to show how much Isha had been holding back during their training sessions the past 2 days.
And while Su Ling was still reeling in surprise, Isha struck again. The monster that had been lunging toward her didn't even get close before it was split in two, and the one furthest away that had been trying to pounce on Su Ling was cleaved through the middle by an invisible sword aura.
Isha really hadn't been blowing smoke. These monsters were genuinely just cannon fodder to her. Threatening wasn't even the word for it. At best, they were warm-up material.
Su Ling couldn't help but feel a little something. Sometimes the gap between people was bigger than the gap between humans and dogs. If she had been the one dealing with these monsters, she'd probably be stuck between someone's teeth by now.
As she reflected on this, the dead monsters began to change. A wisp of gray smoke peeled away from each corpse, and those bodies that had still looked like flesh and blood just moments ago withered at a visible speed, turning dark and brittle as charcoal.
Then all that gray smoke came rushing toward Isha at once. But Isha seemed completely unaware of it. She was still scanning her surroundings with a sharp eye, though her vigilance was aimed at any monsters that might suddenly appear, not at the gray smoke.
Through Su Ling's Spirit Eye, she watched as the smoke made contact with Isha and seeped directly into her body. Then, whether it was her imagination or not, Su Ling felt like the blade of the knight sword in Isha's hand had somehow become murkier.
If the sword had given her the impression of being as smooth and clean as jade before, it now felt like fine dust had been mixed into it. At a glance, you might not notice anything, but under Su Ling's gaze right now, that taint was glaringly, painfully obvious.
Something wasn't right.
Her instincts sounded the alarm. Su Ling slowly raised her head and looked up at the sky. The night sky held nothing but a single moon casting its cold, pale light. And beneath that moonlight, a hemispherical barrier like an upturned bowl hung over everything, its edges stretching beyond sight.
"Spirit Eye. It allows you to see what ordinary people cannot, and to perceive the truth hidden beneath the surface of things." Lu's voice sounded again. She was standing right beside Su Ling, looking up at the same sky Su Ling was seeing.
Under normal circumstances, it was impossible to share a talent ability with another person. But for reasons unknown, perhaps because she had given her ability to Su Ling, Su Ling's Spirit Eye was feeding back to her as well. Though unlike Su Ling, she couldn't activate or deactivate it at will.
Her Spirit Eye was passively shared. It only activated when Su Ling used hers, so whatever Su Ling could see, she could see as well.
"So she just traded one small cage for a slightly bigger one?" Su Ling parted her lips and spoke quietly.
Her voice was so soft it felt like the wind might carry it away, but the wind couldn't bring her words to Isha's ears. The only one who could hear what she said was Lu, standing right beside her.
"It's not a cage." Lu shook her head. Her gaze shifted from the sky to Isha, watching the relaxed smile on the other person's face after she confirmed the area was safe. Something in Lu's voice seemed to struggle to stay steady. "It's a graveyard."
Su Ling's body trembled. She wanted to say something more, but Lu was already gone. Isha was running toward her, and Lu apparently had no intention of elaborating on what she had just said.
Because she knew Su Ling had already figured out the answer. It was just that Su Ling didn't dare, and didn't want, to believe it.
Just like how you can never wake someone who's pretending to be asleep, a person who refuses to accept the truth will always find an excuse to look away no matter how much you say. So the only way was to let her see it with her own eyes, let her discover it herself, let her confirm with her own hands the truth she had already guessed.
Lu was gone. Or perhaps "gone" wasn't quite the right word, since she had simply returned to the sword. She had said everything she needed to say, and the time from here on could be left to Su Ling and Isha.
This was a simple journey. Simple enough that Lu didn't really need to say or do anything at all for Su Ling to reach the end.
But it was also a heavy journey. Heavy enough that Su Ling might never be able to forget it, and heavy enough to make her understand that without strength, there was nothing she could do.
"Xiao Ling, over here!" Isha stopped at a fork in the road, shouting and waving toward Su Ling.
Words piled up in her throat. Su Ling wanted to say something to Isha, but didn't know where to start. In the end, she only fell silent and walked toward Isha, then followed her down the right path of the fork.
The 2 of them walked further and further down the right path until the left path disappeared from view, until the fork was long behind them.
Whether it was bad luck on Isha's part or whether the town had already become the monsters' playground, the journey was anything but peaceful. Monsters lurked everywhere, launching attacks from the strangest of places, but faced with Isha's strength, their ambushes were nothing more than a different kind of performance.
Every swing of the knight sword brought with it the death of a monster, and with every death, gray smoke would peel away from the corpse and sink into Isha's body.
To the naked eye, nothing seemed to have changed. But through the Spirit Eye, the sword in Isha's hand was growing more and more tainted. That sword seemed to mirror Isha's internal state. As she cut down monsters, she was being contaminated by them.
Is it because she's the one landing the kills? Does the gray smoke lock onto whoever lands the killing blow, and then corrupt them?
Su Ling furrowed her brow and muttered to herself. This hypothesis was actually easy enough to test. She could kill a monster herself and observe what happened afterward.
But that method wasn't without risk. First, there was the question of what would actually happen when that bizarre gray smoke entered the body. Second, the fight itself was far from low-risk. Sure, killing these things looked easy when Isha did it, but for Su Ling, it would be a life-or-death fight with everything on the line.
Of course, she wouldn't have come up with this idea without something to back her up. The World Tree was something else. Not only could it pause time, it had sent her into this completely unfamiliar world, and could even rewrite her genes, transforming her from a human into a silver dragon.
With something that extraordinary in her corner, Su Ling figured that even if the gray smoke really did have some effect on the body, it should be possible to flush it out through the World Tree. And if she could figure out what the gray smoke actually was in the process, that would be a massive gain.
"If you want to do it, then do it. I'll be right here beside you." Lu's voice was cool and detached, carrying almost no emotion at all. But those few brief words gave Su Ling an enormous surge of confidence and courage.
So when yet another monster jumped out to block the path, Su Ling stepped forward and held back Isha who had reached for her sword. She smiled. "Let me try. I want to see what I can actually do."
Isha looked at Su Ling and didn't respond right away. She appeared to be thinking it over. The monster that had appeared up ahead was a spider-type. Creepy looking, no doubt, but in terms of raw power it was firmly in the lowest tier.
Using something like this for Su Ling to practice on was honestly fine. Even if something unexpected happened, she could step in immediately, and more importantly...
Isha extended her senses, confirmed there was only that single spider monster in the vicinity, and nodded in agreement.
Even though sword training had already given Su Ling a taste of what combat felt like, when it came to a real fight, she still couldn't help but feel a little nervous.
She closed her eyes and took 2 deep breaths, calming her slightly elevated heartbeat back to normal. Then she drew the sword at her hip and walked toward the monster.
Faced with the one who was strong staying put and the weaker one walking toward it, the monster became wary for a moment. Its throat let out a sharp hissing warning. But when it saw that Su Ling had no intention of stopping, that hiss turned into something more furious.
Monsters had feelings too. It felt like it was being looked down on. The tall one gave it a sense of danger, but in its eyes, the short one was just food. Being provoked by food made it absolutely furious.
All four limbs pumped in alternation, and the spider monster barreled toward Su Ling like a runaway truck. Its fangs jutted upward as its mouth gaped wide, putrid breath blasting forward. Any person with weaker nerves would've probably been rooted to the spot in terror.
But Su Ling's eyes stayed calm. A point of crimson red surfaced at the center of her pupils, and the runes on the Immortal-Slaying Sword in her hand lit up, the blade bathed in a bright layer of red light.
Blood Blade, activate!
Her dragon wings manifested and swept downward with force. Su Ling, who had been walking just a moment ago, vanished from her spot, leaving nothing behind but a flash of a blood-red sword trail fading in the air.
The spider monster was about the size of a water buffalo. Unless it could fly, it was hard to hit a vital spot directly, and Su Ling hadn't planned on going for the vitals from the start anyway. After all, this was a battle against an opponent above her level, and what mattered most when fighting above your level?
Strong mental fortitude? A trump card that surpassed your current ability? No, it was whether your weapon could actually break through the enemy's defense.
Su Ling had been observing earlier. When Isha's blade struck the spider monster's vital spots, it didn't look like cutting through flesh at all. It was more like the shattering of something hard, almost like a mirror breaking.
Sure, Isha made it look effortless, but what was Isha's strength level? What was the quality of her weapon? Su Ling's ability fell short of hers, and even if the Immortal-Slaying Sword might once have been an impressive weapon, right now it was nothing more than White quality.
Su Ling didn't think she could shatter the spider monster's vital points directly, so she needed a way to boost her weapon's Sharpness first. And the only way she had to do that right now was her one and only active skill: Blood Blade!
While sidestepping the spider monster's stomping attack, Su Ling spun and slashed at one of its front legs. Just as she expected, the moment the sword made contact with the monster's limb, it felt like sinking into an extremely tough, rubbery substance.
Good thing she had used a burst of speed to drive the blade through the cut, otherwise a normal swing probably wouldn't have broken the skin at all!
A small wound less than half a centimeter appeared on the spider monster's front leg. Tiny enough to be almost negligible, yet from that tiny wound, a massive gush of dark green blood suddenly erupted!
Most of it splattered onto the surrounding walls and ground. Only the purest, tiniest fraction surged toward the Immortal-Slaying Sword in Su Ling's hand, where it was absorbed into the blade. The red glow of the sword deepened visibly.
Su Ling glanced at the Immortal-Slaying Sword in her hand.
【Current Status: Sharpness +1, lasts 30 minutes.】
"No idea how many stacks of Sharpness this can go up to."
Su Ling sighed inwardly, but the moment that thought finished forming, Lu's voice sounded in her ear. "Each hit that deals damage grants Sharpness +1, up to a maximum of 3 stacks. When fully stacked, the duration is doubled."
A flicker of surprise crossed Su Ling's eyes. She dodged a heavy stomp from the spider monster and swung at the same wound again. "How do you know that?"
"For one, that ability was given to you by me. Of course I know its exact effects." Lu paused, then continued, "For another, if you had just checked the skill details, you wouldn't even be asking."
Hearing Lu's answer, Su Ling's face turned a little red. She used her sword to block the spider monster's incoming fangs, and with the strength of a great dragon behind her, even in a contest of brute force she wasn't at a disadvantage. She even had the presence of mind to keep chatting with Lu.
"I didn't know the skill menu had a details option!"
"Well, now you do. Make a habit of checking it when you have time. Don't wait until you actually need a skill and not even know what it does."
"I know, I know, I'll check it once we get back, okay!!"
Scales surfaced along her arms, and Su Ling gripped the sword with both hands, launching the monster into the air with a powerful upward swing. She immediately dashed in close to the front legs and struck the already-widened wound once more.
With 2 stacks of Sharpness now built up, hitting the monster was noticeably less straining. That said, Su Ling had already abandoned the idea of finishing it off with a single hit to the vitals, because even with stacked Sharpness, striking the monster's body still couldn't be called easy.
If just cutting through flesh felt like this, then leaving even a scratch on the armored shell protecting its vitals would take every last bit of strength she had. So she could only fall back on a time-consuming approach: grind it down.
It was a good thing Blood Blade dealt percentage-based damage off the enemy's max HP, otherwise there would be nothing to grind with in the first place. And there was another reason she could even attempt this: that spider monster was a slow, lumbering type, which meant her attacks could connect with relative ease.
Spinning to dodge another steamroller charge, the blade found the same wound again. Blood had sprayed all over the walls and floor around them, and the spreading stench was making Su Ling wrinkle her nose.
Her sense of smell was a lot more sensitive than before too. The foul odor was uncomfortable, but that was as far as it went. The spider monster hadn't managed to touch her once this whole time, and the nimble, fluid footwork she was showing off had been beaten into her one stick at a time by Isha over the past 2 days.
It was in that moment that Su Ling fully understood something Lu had once said: as long as you're fast enough, the enemy's attacks will never reach you.
She felt like she had just discovered the joy of a perfect dodge. Even if the perfect dodges she had right now were bought with 2 days of getting hit.