"Chase!" Sentinel Mao roared.
Although their vanishing trick might have fooled the average passerby, she was a Perception Realm Expert. Her Martial Perception could track them! She immediately stomped off the ground and charged off in their direction. Likewise, she was followed by Little Sword, Lord Xiaobo, and Lord Ru, who also kept Benedict and Shirley firmly in their sights. Embarrassingly enough, the remaining fifteen or so Perception Realms had to follow their lead, since their grasp over their Martial Perception was that much poorer. It made Sentinel Mao, and the other experts snort and look down on them. They were a joke.
Little Sword glanced at some soldiers and chastised them, "You three almost killed the princess with your flying strikes. What were you thinking? We're trying to capture her, not kill her." This made the soldiers shrink back.
"Don't be so hard on them," Lord Xiaobo said in passing. "Their friends were killed by that monster. It's not easy to keep your cool after that."
"Sir Winstin, right? I didn't think that he would be that strong even on his deathbed," Lord Ru added. "We're lucky that we didn't fight against him."
"However, because of that, he was killed by a nameless expert instead. That could've been our achievement!"
"That does sound nice… What a shame. What a shame…"
Little Sword looked down on them. To suggest that a legendary knight like Sir Winstin should be killed by lowly criminals such as themselves was insulting to both Sir Winstin and Perception Realms in general. He could not help but feel disgusted. That contempt was noticed by Lord Xiaobo and Lord Ru, who glared at him in return. The atmosphere grew slightly tense. It was at this moment that Sentinel Mao chose to spoke up.
"Behave yourselves. Since Sentinel Kong is gone, I'm taking command," she declared coolly. She was the only Imperial Sentinel left, so that was a matter of course.
Whoosh! The air rushed past them, as they continued through the forest at high speeds. Despite the short time advantage, Benedict and Shirley managed to gain a sizable lead thanks to their martial techniques. Sentinel Mao and the others could not even see their figures. That was how far ahead they were! However, they could not get away. Benedict and Shirley were carrying two people each, and they were heavily injured, leaving a long trail of blood behind them. It would be a joke if their pursuers could not catch up, much less track them. The small lead was slowly, but steadily shrinking. It was only a matter of time now! The field suddenly opened. There! They could finally see Benedict and Shirley, except… Freon was prepared for them. He had a magic circle ready.
"Scatter!" Sentinel Mao shouted.
"Die!" Freon roared, unleashing his remaining Magic Energy into one last spell.
Boom! A humongous beam of light launched forth as it generated a powerful recoil that deformed the ground and produced a shockwave. The initial force was already this great! That was because he decided to use his full Bloodline Ability to amplify this spell as much as possible. It would be his strongest strike! Halfway through, the beam scattered and divided into thirty-six smaller beams, which then accelerated further. It was the High Gaseous Fog fire-type spell, Thirty-Six Falling Stars! Sentinel Mao, and the other experts leapt out of the way, but most of the soldiers were too slow to react. The beams descended with frightening ferocity before exploding. Boom! A series of thirty-six explosions rocked the mountainside, blooming into ginormous dust clouds. Whole trees and boulders rained down, as the entire earth began to shift. The spell had triggered a landslide! While their enemies were caught in the wake, Benedict and Shirley dashed off again. When the vast amounts of earth reached the bottom of the ravine, it created a shockwave many times greater than Freon's spell. The power of mother nature was truly hard to imagine!
The ground rumbled and shook like a tantrum-throwing child, as a vast dust cloud rolled over the lands. Sentinel Mao leaned against a tree and panted heavily, trying to catch her breath. Her clean uniform had been transformed into a filthy one, covered in dirt and leaves. After dislodging splinters from her arms and legs, blood trickled down. She looked miserable. She was lucky enough to avoid the worst of the landslide, but she was still fearful. A Martial Perception was not an omnipotent thing. At its most basic level, it empowered the five senses: hearing, sight, touch, smell, and taste. It could not function like a Magic Perception, which perceived the immaterial. That was why she, along with the others, failed to detect Freon's spell ahead of time. It was an excellent ambush. The only reason she noticed something was wrong was due to Freon's strong killing intent. Otherwise, she would have taken that attack head-on and died. It was too close for comfort. Once again, she cursed the existence of Arcanists. If she knew Martial Energy, then she would have captured everyone already!
"Sentinel Mao!" someone shouted.
"Little Sword, you survived."
"Yes, but barely," the swordsman replied. Apparently, in the chaos, a stray rock managed to hit and break his leg. He was limping over, leading Sentinel Mao to frown. They originally had Benedict and Shirley on the ropes yet… she glanced at the collapsed mountainside, the absent soldiers, and their newfound injuries. The situation had somehow reversed on them. It was unbelievable.
"What about Lord Xiaobo and Lord Ru?"
"I couldn't see them."
Sentinel Mao sighed. She lost track of Benedict and Shirley in the commotion too. That meant this chase was effectively over. "Let's try to find more survivors before retreating. We'll have to inform our superiors that we failed our pursuit, but the princess shouldn't be too far from here. It might be possible to send another group after her."
"Understood."
Elsewhere on the other side of the landslide, Benedict and Shirley crashed into the hard ground, lacking even the strength to cushion their own falls. That was how wounded they were. This was unsurprising. They had fought in multiple high intensity battlefields in a short period of time. First, they had defeated hundreds of the Imperial Council's soldiers in the forest. Next, they were attacked by Lord Xu and thirty Fundamental Realm Masters and Half-Perception Realms at their camp. They could only flee after Shirley made a big sacrifice. Lord Xu then hounded them down, and nearly succeeded in killing Benedict until he had broken through to Perception Realm at the last possible second and executed his new technique. Although they managed to survive, their life-threatening injuries made their outlooks grim. They were going to die anyways. However, because of some inexplicable circumstances that he did not understand, they were restored to their peak conditions.
Afterwards, they fell under the joint attack of Lord Xu, Little Sword, the Tiuxan couple, and the bald man, all of whom were formidable Perception Realms. It took incredible effort and luck for Benedict and Shirley to escape their assault. The two then reunited with Elizabeth and Freon and tore open the Imperial Council's encirclement. They had killed Sentinel Feng too, who was a mighty Perception Realm Expert in his own right. Finally, they had fended off the assault of Sentinel Mao, Little Sword, Lord Xiaobo, and Lord Ru before Elizabeth and Freon created an opening to escape… Every battle could have been written down in the history books and yet, everything transpired in less than an hour. It was truly unthinkable how much had happened in that short timeframe! However, this was really it. They had finally, honestly, reached their limits. They could not do anything more.
Freon was the same. He rolled on his back and coughed out some blood. His internal injuries were severe. First, he, Elizabeth, and the Ten Dawns had used their strongest long-range means to annihilate the soldiers in the forest. Then, they were ambushed by the three Imperial Sentinels and a large amount of Perception Realms while they were recovering. They had tried to fight back with their spells, but due to an unfortunate series of backlashes, all of them were rendered incapable of fighting. Later, Elizabeth persevered with sheer willpower, long enough to rouse Freon awake and urge him to use Verdant Apathy on them. This was not exactly easy, given his unstable Core and Channels, though he succeeded. Next, he had helped Ten Dawn Iris, who taught them spells that could heal their backlashes. Freon and Elizabeth then learned and practiced spells in the middle of battle, a testament to their ability and concentration. Those spells would eventually be rewritten by Rena though to fully heal them, and Benedict and Shirley an unknown distance away.