Paragon of Sin

Chapter 1980: Brutality of War

The scene before them was a nightmarish hellscape, evidence of the evils of war, the toil, the price, and the sacrifice necessary to fuel progression and continue conflict-a crumbled land of bloodied, mangled, and incomplete corpses. The sight could curl blood within one's veins, and Tilly was experiencing that sensation to the fullest. Despite her identity as an Entry Moderator, rarely did she land within the active battlefield or see the chaotic horrors that were left behind.

Hands over her mouth, Tilly visibly trembled at the sight of thousands of dead. Gently, a strong hand held her shoulder, granting her a cool sensation of comfort and safety. She leaned in, finding warmth in proximity; only then was she able to stop shaking out of terror.

Wei Wuyin's gaze was calm, slowly observing the corpses and destroyed buildings before him with cold apathy. This was supposed to be a 'safe zone'. While not protected by the rules of the battlefield in any special way, it was a fortified location used as a headquarters for operations and planning, where a military camp was established for one side. Additionally, it was remarkably deep and embedded in allied territory that was seized and secured for centuries or more.

For this place to fall, the enemy not only penetrated deeply, but they had done so with merciless momentum, laying to waste these soldiers and commanders en masse. The buildings were built upon with Essence of War, imbued with the Metal, Earth, and Wood Intent at the World Heart Intent level, the rough equivalent of a Mystic-World graded materials. The culprits held terrifying strength despite the oppressive suppression of the Ascendant Battlefield.

Wei Wuyin took a few steps forward, gently moving the corpses aside, assessing the damage with his Spiritual Sense. With his temporal perception and mental strength, he rapidly recreated shadowy visages of the battle with an eerie accuracy. The shadows glided and dashed, fought, clashed, defended, died, survived, begged, and roared with the unwillingness of a lifeform hungry for life. They were violent and terrifying.

Each soldier present was an Ascended being subjected to the oppressive suppression of the Ascendant Battlefield, and while it was far stronger than the Stellar Battlefield, the strength they could exert was far greater than that of mere mortals. Many could fly or unleash arts, spells, and utilize mystic armaments, as the Commanders of the Stellar Battlefield could do. They were powerful, possessing life-saving skills inherently born from their cultivation stage, and confidence born from their understanding of their strength to enter the battlefield and survive.

Deaths were rare. Far rarer than in the Stellar Battlefield, where Astral Core Realm cultivators died in vast numbers each second. Yet here, laying before him, were Ascended beings slaughtered in great numbers exceeding hundreds of thousands. The recreation he observed noted a few distinct clues.

Firstly, this was done by a smaller group in comparison to the camp, with wounds being largely consistent and repetitive by the same weapon and aura. This was likely the result of a single Battalion, a thousand or so warriors. They worked in flawless tandem, supporting and reinforcing each other, even saving the lives of each other with precision while simultaneously slaying their enemies.

They had some tactics that Wei Wuyin was keenly familiar with, deployed in his own war expedition within the Heavenly Realm of War, channeling the intrinsic profundities of the Law of War. The most pivotal was Banner Intent and Siege Intent, executed by a phenomenal Commander. They had an unspoken unity and pristine coordination, likely connected on a greater level of sensory and mind, possibly communicating mentally or intuitively through the utilization of Intent.

He also noticed that the weapons wielded by this elite Battalion far surpassed those laying here. Their armors and weapons were split, shattered, or broken. Since the majority of these armors and weapons were forged through the Essence of War, the only material not suppressed or affected by the oppressively ambient restrictive force, they likely had utilized an Apex-Level Intent to forge them.

Similar to the Elemental Intents, such as Absolute Hot Fire Intent and Absolute Zero Ice Intent, other Intents had varying degrees of Intent variations, but they were equally as difficult to comprehend, and not nearly as inflexible. A cultivator's Sword or Saber Intent can be classified as Apex-level by virtue of its strength.

Wei Wuyin's Saber Intent, for example, embodied the essence of the 'end' in its edge. The Omega Saber Intent was an Apex-level Intent. However, while Wei Wuyin was using common terminology that he was familiar with, he knew that outside the Material Dao, specifically the War Dao, the official term was 'Limitless' Intent. It denoted a limitless potential, a grand title earned through quality and power.

Lastly, the corpses belonged only to the allied camp. While some of the shadowy figures died from desperate retaliation or faced those of great skill that required dozens to bring down, those from the attacking group had brought their dead away, leaving not a single hair behind. He couldn't even find a drop of their blood.

'Did they even bleed?'

As his brows furrowed, Tilly bravely traversed the corpses to arrive by Wei Wuyin's side and asked in a rather timid yet curious voice, "Who could have done this?" She was looking for some answers; her perception and depth of understanding paled far beneath this man before her.

Wei Wuyin softly inhaled, exhaling out as he glanced at the faintly sanguine-colored sky that was laced with dense blood energy. "So it's begun, huh?" The remark prompted Tilly's brows to rise.

"What's begun?" Tilly was unable to understand. What could have started this carnage?

Wei Wuyin's eyes slightly darkened, "The race for the last Daospark." His gaze lowered to the horizon, sensing a tumultuous tremble in the air infused with the comings of death and despair, all for the sake of progression of the true elites, adding with a somber tone: "A storm of blood and death is coming."

Tilly inexplicably perceived her heart race by an unfathomable force. Her gaze naturally drew to the horizon, squinting as she saw shadows in the distance. She shook. Lowering her head, she saw a broken sword plunged into a corpse quiver slightly. She felt that same quiver traverse the distance, reaching the soles of her shoes, traveling through her legs, then her hips, and lastly her throat.

"That's..." Her face blanched immediately upon realizing what this development meant. Her head snapped upwards as the desire to run was born within her soul.

Wei Wuyin was unaffected, only slowly touching the hilt of his saber as the Law of War stirred within him. "Is there a way to locate others through their War Souls, or better yet, the Identity Runes we hold to contain them?"

"Wha-? What?" Tilly was taken aback by the abrupt question, as her eyes were reflecting the image of many humanoid figures rushing violently towards them. They were hundreds of miles away, yet the sheer momentum of their charge was so terrifying that she could feel the earth itself tremble from here. However, she instinctively got used to answering Wei Wuyin's questions or providing answers as a way to feel useful. As such, she answered almost unconsciously: "There shouldn't be-No. Wait. There might be a way!"

Wei Wuyin brought out his Identity Runes that contained his War Souls acquired from the Stellar and Ascendant Battlefield. There was an unsettling number within his Identity Runes. While the Stellar Battlefield's Identity Rune contained only Stellar-grade War Souls, the Ascendant Battlefield contained Ascendant-grade War Souls.

"I remember now! I've heard rumors that a Supreme Seer had invented a Soul Scrying Tool to locate War Souls. However, they were only viable beyond the Battlefield. Some of the Entry Moderators had found them, but they were ineffective due to environmental suppression prevalent in all Battlefields." Tilly had dug into the depths of her knowledge and pulled out genuinely relevant information.

"So that's what this is." Within Wei Wuyin's palm was a metallic compass roughly double the size of his palm, barely allowing him to hold it with a single hand, that was a half-dome grid of green with equidistant black lines. On this grid were two shining golden star-like dots at the center, brightly lit and pulsating. He had found this tool on a few of the corpses.

The central dots were most likely him. The shining stars brightly lit on its surface were both his Identity Runes. A closer look would find a distinctly different dot, belonging to Tilly, but it was white. This might suggest her Identity Rune was different, tailored to her identity as an Entry Moderator, and therefore unable to be claimed.

"It won't be precise!" Tilly added as she stifled her urge to flee.

"It isn't," Wei Wuyin noted as the grid wasn't very informative in terms of how many War Souls his Identity Runes possessed, as he noted that, from the far edges of its sensory range, likely a few hundred miles, those shadowy figures moving at rabid speeds towards him had been indicated on the grid as a thousand stars. None of which was greater than the others. While his was notably brighter, it wasn't by much.

"Is that...is that it?" Tilly requested.

Wei Wuyin kept the Soul Scrying Tool. "Stay here." With that order given, he slowly walked towards the incoming enemies. These were Ascended beings that sought to fight for the Daospark, and they were likely elites of elites. From their roaring killing intent, they had seen slaughter and war in great quantities.

In other words, they were living and breathing spoils of war waiting to be claimed and the perfect training tools.

Wei Wuyin gently called out, "Athena."