Chapter 380 The Players Have Arrived
Upon hearing Aster’s words, Natasha and Charlotte immediately closed their bottles with the corks again, most of the time elixirs lost some of their effectiveness by being exposed to the atmosphere, or with the pass of the time.
So, they put the corks on the bottles and kept them in their spatial rings, while they both gazed at Aster.
Though the rings they gave him were indeed expensive treasures it was a matter of perspective, the process was relatively new that’s why the demand was high thus making it overpriced, but it was a situation that would change in a couple of years.
The divine “elixirs” Aster handed them on the other hand, were lifesaving graces, which everyone has, is and will be struggling to get.
A universal cure/healing type elixir that can be used in a critical state, without any prior preparations and that also patches up a meridian or even the dantian, for someone in the “Mortal” realm is priceless.
Ironically, these kinds of medicaments are easier to make for those who have surpassed the Heavenly Conqueror realm, for a variety of reasons, first the ingredients that have that kind of properties are all above the Heavenly Conqueror realm, second the strength of the resulting medicine is too much for mortal realms to handle, so if drank there is a 99% of death.
The remaining 1% is the possibility of a miracle happening, or the one drinking it having an insanely monstrous constitution that can withstand a tremendous amount of tension.
That being said, the alchemists in the pinnacle of their field do believe that even death isn’t an incurable disease, so sometimes they decide to make a bet, and use a plethora of ingredients, which reduce the strength of the medicine to the bare minimum, lowering the purity so that the one taking it might be able to survive by the skin of its teeth.
Of course, such a low purity elixir has a on of possible side effects, but if compared to the alternative which is death, then the choice is obvious, getting a successful case of a surviving patient like that, is an honor for said alchemist too.
While Natasha and Charlotte didn’t doubt a single word of what Aster told them, their protectors both glared at Aster.
“Kid I have come to respect you as your potential is worthy of my young miss’s attention, but if you ae lying and that elixir hurts her, I’ll chase you to the end of the universe”.
“Not to mention my Moon Stream Luan clan, will hunt you down too”, added Charlotte’s protector.
Aster shrugged, he did what he believes is correct, that’s all that mattered to him, whether others believed him or not, was not his problem, the ones that he wanted to thank seemed happy with the gift, so he put the subject at the back of his mind, as he had more pending matters to tend to right now.
Aster then asked Natasha and Charlotte how to use the ring.
“It’s similar to a spatial ring by all means, the difference is that this one interacts with the outside so it can take in oxygen so that a living being can survive, there are filters and other things to prevent problems in the insides of the ring, you can also send food and other stuff to make you tamed beast more comfortable~”, this was one of the few technical subjects Natasha knows a lot about, since her mother is a beast tamer, profession which Aster heard about for the first time here.
“As for the spirit beast, if it has a contract with you then you just need to order it to enter as it can’t go against your orders then there is no problem, the other method id for the spirit beast to willingly enter”, added Charlotte, though she didn’t mention that profession to be in her family, she was quite knowledgeable about a variety of things, as she liked to read a lot.
Aster nodded in response, before he spoke out loud.
“Espi, I know you can understand us to a certain extent, I now have a way to bring you with us, do you want to come with me and Kana, be aware that we will be leav…”.
“Hisss!”, Aster hadn’t finished speaking, when Espi’s loud happy hisses made it clear, the little sand wyrm wanted to tag along, even if it meant leaving its native place.
“Well, I guess that solves it”, mumbled Aster.
“Yeei, Espi is coming with us~”, besides Espi itself, the most excited about it was none other than Kana, as she has become friends with the spirit beast during the past days.
Leaving that little episode aside, Espi surfaced and then everyone got out of the portable house, after Ixas stored the house in his ring.
Aster then pointed his left hand at Espi, it is worth mentioning he put both Natasha and Charlotte’s rings in his left index finger as the ring one is occupied with his daily life spatial ring.
Espi hissed one more time before it was sucked in by one of the two rings, Espi chose Natasha’s ring as Aster left the decision to it, but he was careful enough to not let those two notice it, so that they wouldn’t start arguing right now.
Normally he wouldn’t mind if they did, but right now both he and Mylene noticed there were other people finally arriving at the border of the valley from the other directions.
Aster’s group arrived by the east which was the area where Natasha and Charlotte were active, the woman from the Storm Roc clan entered their “territory”, and that’s why they were chasing her.
From the west Aster saw a group which included that woman who he fought back then, accompanied by other guys that shared resemblance with her, green lime hair being the common thing they all shared, guiding them there was a guy that seemed to be in his early twenties, tall and slim, light green hair and green eyes, he was wearing a black and green get up, which consisted in pants a shirt and boots, that was the young master of the Storm Roc family, Ley Tempest.
Aster frowned; his spirit sense was strong enough to notice that guy was on a different level compared to all the cultivators from the young generation he has fought so far.
And he wasn’t alone, besides the group from the Storm Roc family, there was second group of people all wearing black clothes and with black long hair, in contrast with the Storm Roc family which had some girls in it, they were all guys, the one leading them was a guy in his middle twenties, slim but athletic, he wore black lose pants and had most of his upper body in plain view.
“Those grim guys are the allies of the Storm Roc family, the Black Vulture family, and their asshole young master, Rox Vultari”, mumbled Charlotte with a slightly aggressive voice, a quite rare situation given how composed she normally acts.
“Ah right, wasn’t that one of the guys that formed in line to get into your pants?”, said Natasha with her usual playful voice.
Charlotte softly snorted as she turned her head away, making Natasha stuck her tongue at her.
“I have been wondering, but those two guys have a group with them, so hat happened to yours?”, asked Aster, which made both Natasha and Charlotte uncomfortably laugh.
“I kind of told them to piss off… it’s not my fault they were sent by my mom to watch me over, so they returned to the Divine Feather Firmament and Yulia was sent in their place~”, said Natasha referring to her protector which Aster finally got to know her name.
“Mm, my subordinates and me had a… discussion because they were doing some things I didn’t like, so I kicked them out of my sight, and my mom and aunt sent Lizzette to help me”, added Natasha.
Aster knew there was probably more about how they ended up being alone, but this wasn’t the time to enter into details, as two new waves of spirit energy entered his detection area, and they were different to anything he has felt or seen so far.
The group that arrived from the south was conformed by people with shaved heads and outfits, that remembered Aster of the shaolin monks back at earth, the one leading them was a guy in his late twenties, like all of them he had a perfectly shaved head, but he had a giant scroll on his back, his eyes were closed, though he was gazing at the others that arrived.
The one who took the initiative to explain this time was Ixas.
“I recognize those guys, they come from the Martial Firmament and are one of the strongest forces there, the Diamond Vajra Sect, as for the one leading them it should be the current “Kai”, a name given to the most talented in the young generation”.
But then the fourth group that arrived was the one that got the attention of the majority here, tall and bulky bodies with leather pants and exposed upper bodies, as well a chest or arm hair, but their most eye-catching characteristic was the fact that their skin was green and they had big tusks that protruded from their mouths.
This time Natasha, Charlotte and even Mylene remained silent, meaning they didn’t know that race, but Yulia in other words Natasha’s protector did say something.
“That is one of the races that had declared the war against other Divine Firmaments and won, after going through a lot of carnage and blood spilling, they call themselves “Orcrary”, they are also the ones that captured and sold the most wyrms, they are just a bunch of savages that prey on the weak humph”.
Aster raised an eyebrow, no matter how he looked at those guys, they were the orcs from the videogames he played back at earth, the one leading them though, was different, the others weren’t exactly fit and had a mix of big stomachs and marked abs, but the leader was not only younger looking not that much, as it seemed to be in his thirties, but that could be a race trait.
In any case the leader was smaller in size, but his body was fully muscular without the fat the others had, his skin tone was also gray instead of green like the others, he was wearing pants made out of the fur of an animal and was wielding an old ax, something that Aster noticed was the whole group had some red stains on their clothes and even from this distance, they reeked of blood.
“It’s him, brother, he is the one that hurt me, those bitches probably set me up as they chased me all the way to where I found him!”, the woman from the Storm Roc family suddenly went ballistic as she caught a glimpse of Aster’s group.
Ley Tempest, slowly turned to see Aster but after a split of a second his attention drifted to Kana, to whom he sweetly smiled.
But Kana who was all smiles a moment ago due to Espi now being taken back home with them, suddenly felt an unpleasant sensation, she noticed a green haired man smiling at her and she frowned before she hugged Aster’s right side, with a defensive expression on her face.
“Big brother, he is one of the bad guys, right?”, she asked with her innocent voice, which made Aster chuckle.
“Yeah, but don’t worry, I won’t let him put a single finger on you”, said Aster as he patted Kana’s head.
‘In fact, when I’m finished with him, he isn’t going to have anything with which touch anything’, thought Aster remembering what he read in the letter Espi found in the pocket of one of the corpses.
“Mm~”, Kana returned to her smiling self and she hummed while enjoying being caressed by Aster.
Needless to say, but Ley frowned upon seeing Kana, he glared at his sister which made her tremble a bit.
“Ley, it seems someone stole your little princess away from you hahaha”, the guy who Charlotte called Rox, mocked Ley although they were supposed to be allies.
“In case your eyes have suddenly gone blind, the girl from the Moon Stream Luan clan, who you have the hots for, is standing right there, next to the one who “stole” me, you idiot”, answered Ley.
Rox’s eyes narrowed until they were almost closed, of course he noticed Charlotte standing there, but listening to Ley rubbing salt on the wound, made his murderous aura leak from his body.
“Isn’t that why I joined you, we can discuss the loot late, let’s kill those pests right now”.
After saying that, Rox became a line of black light that shot itself towards Aster.
“What’s the point of having a plan if you ignore it!”, shouted Ley with an angry voice, but he still became a gust of wind that aimed at Aster from the other side.𝒐𝐯𝐋xt.𝗰𝑜𝕞
“Don’t underestimate them, if my calculations are right, they aren’t that far from your category at least int current battle prowess, young masters of known forces from the Divine Firmaments aren’t easy to deal with… without taking into account that golden energy of yours”, mumbled Mylene.
Aster nodded, but he still smiled with disdain.
“They aren’t even going to reach this side of the mountain though”.