Chapter 379: I Swear
The fiery evil spirits could be divided into various kinds. The ones living in the Sea of Raging Fire weren't really big, but as for this one in the furnace, it was considerably stronger than the typical fiery evil spirits.
Even a small fiery dragon spirit which was as big as a man's arm had been condensed from the flames. When it went higher up, the heat that was radiating from it was so insufferable. But as luck would have it, the ice phoenix which had just been released by Tia from her precious gem was just as powerful.
As a result, the fiery dragon spirit and the ice phoenix got tangled up with each other, binding and resisting the other. Ice is capable of obliterating fire, while fire, on the other hand, could also melt ice.
For every instance that the ice phoenix descended onto the dragon, the heat and light emanating from the fiery dragon spirit seemed to be weakening a little bit. But in that same moment, flame suddenly rose from the furnace, and once it had coalesced into the dragon's body, the heat and light would both be restored in no time.
And each time the fire dragon spirit set off for an attack, the ice crystals over the ice phoenix's body got thawed a little, and the phoenix gradually decreased in size.
When she noticed that the melting of the ice phoenix had already reached a certain point, Tia instinctively grabbed her precious jade and stroked it with her candle-like fingers. Then, a cold air condensed using the life vitality began to drift away. When the cold air reached the body of the ice phoenix, the phoenix would dramatically increase in size in an instant.
The battle between the ice phoenix and the fiery dragon spirit appeared to have reached an impasse. The ice phoenix had Tia's help in replenishing the cold air, while the fiery dragon spirit also had help, for as long as the flame in the furnace didn't die out, the fiery dragon spirit wouldn't die just as well.
“While I'm fighting against this fiery dragon spirit, you should go ahead and find a way to break the enchanted barrier,” Tia relayed over to Zen.
“The enchanted barrier?” Zen asked under his breath.
Suddenly, he saw a blanket of dull purple light materialize around the stove. The stove was located in the farthest depths of the body of the flood dragon puppet, and there were several protections surrounding it. Zen began thinking what Tia said was true. If this crystal key was not of great importance, then why would there be a need for placing multiple layers of protection?
Clenching his fist, Zen then hit the enchanted barrier as hard as he could, channeling the strength from the dragon scales he had with him.
“Bang!”
The sound that was emitted by Zen's fist striking the enchanted barrier seemed as if he had actually hit an iron wall and the barrier still remained unscathed.
“Relying on your physical strength alone wouldn't be able to cut it,” Tia remarked. “This isn't just any common enchanted barrier, it has been constructed utilizing the force of space, so basically, it's actually a thin compressed layer of space.”
Tia's explanation left Zen completely dumbfounded. “You mean to say, what I have to do is to break a thin layer of space? Just how am I supposed to pull that off? I hope you're not forgetting that the Internal Elixir Realm is not my specialty.”
Putting a crack on that thin blanket of space would be quite hard even for a cultivator at the Internal Elixir Realm, shattering it, even more so. Although, it could be possible if a cultivator at a higher level within this realm gave it a shot.
“Stop overthinking things! Of course, it's not an actual enchanted barrier of space, since the space has just been compressed to a very thin sheet. If it was really an enchanted barrier made from space, there's no way I would have bothered coming here in the first place, because then I'd just be wasting my time from trying to do the impossible.”
Truth be told, she originally intended to have Frank break the enchanted barrier using his spear. Frank was the best among the warriors she had met prior to that point.
The spear's capacity to penetrate something had the greatest force compared to every other weapon. Furthermore, the Spear of Annihilation, the skill which Frank had mastered, had immense power that it had the greatest potential to penetrate the enchanted barrier. Down the line, however, Tia realized that it would be best to choose Zen instead, because he had already cultivated the Heavenly Ogre Fist, an ability which could let him transform the life vitality an immeasurable number of times. And she, fortunately, possessed such an enormous amount of life vitality that could easily be transferred to him.
“This would be the best time to make use of your Heavenly Ogre Fist! I'm going to transfer my life vitality to you,” she instructed. Then, a stream of pure, thick life vitality began pouring toward Zen coming from her hand.
Upon seeing the life vitality seeping from her hand, Zen remembered what the cyan dragon had told him. Such a dense and powerful life vitality undoubtedly wasn't something a cultivator at the Illuminating Soul Realm could possess. Despite the fact that her cultivation level had already been lowered down and her strength was still in a weakened state, she was still significantly much stronger than him.
Zen unleashed a demonic phantom at once, allowing the demonic life vitality of the phantom to merge with Tia's life vitality.
The instant it was consumed by Zen's demonic life vitality, the color of Tia's life vitality changed into a shade of purple-black.
She transferred her life vitality at an intense speed, and Zen's demonic life vitality was reconstructing it at full tilt just as well without having any trouble keeping up with her at all. In just a short period of time, Zen had already produced a mass of purple-black life vitality hanging around him.
“Isn't that enough already?” Zen wondered. The enchanted barrier standing before him was so unyielding. Thank the heavens he hadn't forgotten about his Emerald Crystal, which happened to be designed for breaking enchanted barriers.
“Not yet. But we're almost there,” Tia kept shaking her head. “That's it! Just a little bit more!” Tia insisted, taking out four pieces of supreme life vitality crystals. She clutched the supreme crystals tightly to draw up the life vitality contained within them.
The life vitality bottled up inside the supreme crystal was so pure and intense that there was a chance Zen's belly might not be able to handle even one of the crystals' vitality. Even so, Tia was a bit special, for she could absorb four at the same time. That being said, it wouldn't be so hard to picture out just how strong her belly's bearing ability truly was.
As expected, immediately after absorbing the life vitality from the supreme crystals, she transferred everything again so she could supply Zen with enough force.
This was the new plan Tia came up with. There could also be a possibility that Frank's spear might not be able to pierce the enchanted barrier, but Zen's Heavenly Ogre Fist gave them better odds of pulling it off, so long as the power provided by the life vitality was adequate.
Zen's demonic life vitality devoured every bit of the life vitality that seeped from her and transformed them into the purple-black form. Just as he was about to drain the last bit of life vitality she had, she took out a few more supreme life vitality crystals, shattering them to absorb the life vitality.
The two of them kept on doing that repeatedly, and as a result, the demonic life vitality surrounding Zen was gradually getting bigger and bigger.
Even though the volume of the demonic life vitality which they transformed this time paled in comparison to the previous one that was made by swallowing up the Dark Devil Phantoms in the small world of the Death Road, it could be said that it was still rather massive.
As all of that was happening, the fiery dragon became much, much more agitated, and its striking power just got even more aggressive. She quickly caught on that she couldn't afford to get distracted any longer, so Tia decided to focus on the battle between her ice phoenix and the fiery dragon spirit.
“Go now, quickly! Smash the enchanted barrier into smithereens. I pray that you succeed!” Tia wished Zen luck with a voice filled with anticipation.
During her last attempt to do it, she had failed miserably. As she was trying to break the enchanted barrier, the fiery dragon spirit suddenly appeared to throw her into disarray. She brought Zen with her this time as she couldn't handle it alone. She was determined to succeed with his help.
Zen stretched out his hands upward and went about condensing the demonic life vitality.
The tremendous force that was going to be transmitted by such a rich life vitality should be quite massive. With its help, Zen's power had the potential of becoming stronger than even those of the masters at higher levels of the Illuminating Soul Realm, and it might also achieve the strength of those at the lower levels of Internal Elixir Realm.
If he got supplied with enough life vitality continuously, the power resulting from it could last for an indefinite amount of time and be enhanced.
Of course, that was what you'd call the ideal state, or at least it was, in theory. This was something that wouldn't really be practical to use in an actual combat though, because rarely would anyone be able to get an opportunity to siphon life vitality from another person, and then there was also the lengthy period of time one would need to spend during the process. And no opponent would ever be foolish enough to just sit back and relax as you prepared for your attack. Nevertheless, that option just so happened to be the perfect one for them to take for the situation they were currently in.
Zen was under the assumption that Tia must be quite familiar with how the demonic life vitality worked. His demonic life vitality had been condensed to the extreme, that even the star lights he had been carrying with him got compressed into sparkling diamonds.
“Break it this instant!” Gathering up all of his strength into his arm, Zen darted toward the enchanted barrier as fast as he could.
Witnessing this much awaited moment, Tia's heart was pounding like a drum and her breathing pattern had been thrown off due to so much anticipation. This was the moment she had been waiting for. It was a matter of utmost importance in order for her to be the one to inherit the treasures of the sixth-grade sect.
But Zen's movements suddenly came to a halt while he was still in mid-air.
“What's the matter? Why did you stop all of a sudden?” With her eyebrows deeply furrowed, Tia questioned him.
“There's something I've almost forgotten about,” Zen replied, appearing to be a bit concerned.
“And what might that be?” Tia pried further, raising her voice. The abrupt change in her mental state caused the form of the ice phoenix to go unstable and start shaking all over. She just didn't have the time to deal with any other problems at such a crucial moment.
“What if you still decide to kill me once I finally get the key for you?” Zen wanted to make sure with a serious tone.
“You...” There was an instantaneous change in Tia's facial expression. She was visibly quite agitated.
However, the question Zen asked was a reasonable one. The warriors' world was well-known for its cruelty. You could kill someone for even just a small gain and still no one would even bat an eye, it was nothing out of the usual. What was more, this was a crystal she wanted to get a hold of to acquire the inheritance of a sixth-grade sect, something that the cultivators of Central Region would dream to get their hands on?
It wouldn't be surprising if Tia tried to kill Zen when she finally got the key. In her eyes, that could be the best course of action to take since dead men told no tales.
Zen was just going along with whatever she said, but he was in no way a mere fool, he was far from that. There was no logical reason for him to easily trust a stranger.
“You don't have to worry about that, I won't kill you. I can even give you something in return to make it worth your while, because I am...” Tia stopped in her tracks before she could finish what she was trying to say, a hint of skepticism appeared on her face.
“It doesn't matter who you are or what it is that you're offering to give me. You have enough reasons to kill me, so it wouldn't be able to guarantee my safety, unless you swear with the will of martial arts,” Zen insisted.
No one in their right mind would just carelessly swear with the will of martial arts unless it was a matter of utmost importance.
Swearing with the will of martial arts was even more powerful compared to swearing to heaven. An oath, pledge, promise, swear, vow or whatever it was that one might refer to it as, God had no interest in such nonsense.
But once a warrior had sworn with the will of martial arts, an inner demon would manifest in his heart. If the oath got broken for whatever reason, he could end up being devoured by his inner demon one day. Even if he could somehow manage to hold back the power of the inner demon, it would make it quite difficult for the warrior to improve and attain any further progress in martial arts in the long run.
For that very reason, the thought of mindlessly swearing with the will of martial arts scared a lot of warriors because it could very well bring ruin unto themselves.
“Who do you think you are? Do you see yourself as someone qualified to make me swear to the will of martial arts?” Tia's glare was fixated on Zen, jeering at him coldly. Who would've thought he'd be able to come up with such an atrocious idea?
“Well then, does that mean you don't need me to break down the enchanted barrier anymore?” Zen heaved a heavy sigh.
“How dare you say that to me?” Tia yelled at him out of frustration.
Shrugging his shoulders to annoy her even further, Zen blurted out in a cold tone, “There is nothing I wouldn't dare do.”
He was aware that he could stay safe inside the flood dragon puppet's body for as long as he didn't do things so hastily. 'I shouldn't be wasting my time here with her. It would be better for me to just look for a way out and leave as soon as possible, ' he pondered.
Upon noticing that Zen was planning to leave, while still having to deal with the fiery dragon spirit, Tia was thrown into a state of confusion in a blink of an eye. The goal was already within reach, but there was always something that could go wrong along the way.
Just a second after watching Zen take a few steps away, Tia clenched her jaw and declared, “Okay, you win this time. You said your name was Zen, right? Now that I remember your name, I will make sure you'll regret this. But now, you can rest easy. I promise that I won't kill you. I swear this to the will of martial arts!”