Author's Note: Ahem! Yesterday, due to God's mistake my thoughts were misled and my hand slipped, resulting in me updating Chapter 383(v1.1) instead of Chapter 383(v1.2), both are mostly the same except a paragraph stating that...
"It was Black Steel Empire (Ten Giants are all Empires) at first, but when the Royal Family ruling it gave in to Azure Emperor, it lost its status as an Empire and turned into a Kingdom, Black Steel Kingdom. Likewise, Empress Dongfang also lost her prefix title turning into Queen Dongfang."
Imma telling you again, it was God's fault and not mine, so don't blame me, okeey?
[The note will disappear in 23:59:59.]
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"Woah, how did you find out?" A curious voice reverberated in the sky then a figure of a young man descended from the clouds, looking at the man who just spoke.
The male cultivator looked at the Rex hovering in the sky with a frown. The senses of a Sky Body Formation stage expert are on another level, earlier it wasn't that they didn't sense Rex but it was more like they subconsciously avoided him.
The reason? He didn't have any extraordinary presence, he was just like a monster bird flying around in the sky, having no majestic aura, who would randomly focus their spiritual sense on a bird flying in the sky?
The Black Pendant fulfilled its duty without any mishap, it didn't let even a trace of Qi leak from his body.
As for the ability to change the weather, it wasn't like they didn't read it in the news but more like they never believed it. The information was gathered and bought from lone cultivators and low cultivation base information dealers, such people cannot understand the profound abilities of a Calamity Lord, everything they do would look like a miracle in their eyes. Because of that, the thing about manipulating whether was taken as a joke, it can be an illusion technique at most, or so they thought.
"Long white hairs, red eyes, and young appearance… You are the Calamity Lord from Frozen Flame?" The man asked with a confident tone but inside he was frowning because Rex didn't look injured as stated in the information.
"Yes, I should say, that aside, why don't you two guests come down from the ship and have a talk? If you want to fight, we can also fight in a different place so that the after-effects don't affect others," Rex expressed politely.
He was very reluctant to damage the ship but in others' eyes, he was taking a step back.
When the elite soldiers quietly watching from afar saw it, their confidence rose thinking their enemy wanted to back off. At the same time, they developed a little respect towards Rex, thinking that a Sky Body Formation like him was thinking about them, especially when they were on the enemies' side.
No one knew how would they feel if they knew that what Rex really cared about were the ships and not them.
Both the man and Queen Dongfang were silent on the surface but were conversing in secret.
{What he is thinking?} The man asked.
{It's a phycological move, he is trying to let our guard down, some soldiers are already affected, their battle intent is dropping,} Queen Dongfang assessed his move.
{Just as I thought, now what is the plan? Are we going to directly attack him, or use that trapping array formation together with your generals to trap him?} The man said.
Queen Dongfang looked at him and rolled her eyes. If it wasn't for the Emperor's decree, she wouldn't have brought this inexperienced general together with her. She stopped focusing on him and used the communication jade pendent to order her Generals to prepare themselves to activate the array.
She then looked at Rex again and spoke.
"Let's not beat around the bush, I am the Queen Dongfang from Black Steel Kingdom. Under the decree passed down from the Emperor himself, I came here to regain the lost territory of the Empire, I ask you and the organization behind you to obediently surrender, if you agree then I will request Your Majesty to show some leniency towards you," Queen Dongfang said, she finished speaking and saw the faint smile on Rex's lips, she felt embarrassed.
Claiming lost territory? Azure Empire long abandoned this place long ago for fear of King Of Forest. It was a baseless excuse, just using it made her feel embarrassed, as someone who once ruled one of the ten giant Empires using such an excuse was like blunt self-humiliation, but she wasn't an Empress anymore, she could only follow orders.
Rex only looked at them with a smile and didn't speak.
{I have confirmed, there are no reinforcements behind them, the rats following from shadows are informers of mid and high tier sects who noticed their advancement on the way, there are also few lone cultivators who tailed the ships to reap some benefits from battle but they are weak fries, I let Aiden take care of them,} (Andusk)
{What about the preparation?} (Rex)
{It will take 30 seconds at most, the ships can't escape in one piece,} (Andusk)
Queen Dongfang didn't mind his rudeness as she was delaying time to formulate the plan with her Generals but she didn't know that Rex was doing the same thing, skyships had higher flying speed than cultivators that's why cutting their escape route was a necessity or the enemy can retreat when needed.
"Looks like we don't have a choice but to fight," Rex said as he slowly unfolded his hands.
"Impudent! Don't say that we didn't give you a chance later on," The male Sky Body Formation expert shouted as he took out a silver spear and flew in the air to confront Rex. He wasn't sure if Rex was truly healed or was faking it so he decided to take a gamble, if he won the gamble then he would get the contribution of tacking down a Calamity Lord, even if he lost, he could still retreat.
"You are..." Rex calmly spoke while retreating a little to make some space, he was trying to lure the man away from the ship.
"I am Tai Qiu, the third youngest General in Azure Empire, it's your honor to die in my hands," Tai Qiu said in an arrogant tone.
"Hehe... You seem to have some misunderstanding, I am not your first opponent, defeat my little boys then we can talk," Rex lightly laughed and waved his hand.
The black clouds dissipated and showed the evening sky.
Tai Qiu was about to berate him but then he felt three weak presence flying towards his direction, if it was before then such presence would be completely ignored by him but he had seen how Rex was able to hide his presence, because of that, this time he retreated and looked at the three approaching figures.
Queen Dongfang was also alert, she saw three pitch-black bird flying down from high up in the sky.
The flying birds were very strange, their body structure looked like crows but all their body parts including claws, beak, eyes, were all blacker than charcoal, they didn't have any feathers instead only jet black membrane, they were like crows made of black clay.
Just like Rex, they remained unnoticed but because of the weak life force, the farther they were, the harder it was to notice them, and now that the cover of clouds was gone there was no place for them to hide their bodies.
The three crows had a weaker presence than the monster beasts raised as cattle to be served as dishes in restaurants.
"Little Orange, Little Mango, you two take care of Uncle Tai and Little Berry go meet Aunty Dongfang," Rex said in a loud tone.
..Krrrrreeechh.....
The three crows gave out a shrill screech, then one of them separated itself from the group and flew towards Queen Dongfang while the other two madly rushed at Tai Qiu.
Tai Qiu reacted, he wasn't sure about the strength of the two birds but to be careful he chose to deal with them at once, he waved his spear and thrust it towards the approaching crows.
A majestic Qi phantom of a large grey scaled elephant came out of the spear and moved towards the two crows.
...Boom...
The two crows collided with the elephant phantom and got thrown back without any resistance, they crashed into the ground making a deep pit, their beak got deformed due to the impact, their neck bent at an extreme angle, from the external damage alone it was obvious that the two crows cannot fight again.
Queen Dongfang also wasn't reserved, she had her specialty. She flew into the air and made a grasping motion towards the approaching crow, the ground below the ship deformed turning into a hand then flew above grasping the crow's neck in a flash. She clenched her hand into a fist and the earth hand simultaneously tightened its grip on the crow's neck, breaking it instantly.
Tai Qiu breathed in deeply, he was relaxed, for a moment, he thought the birds would be a serious threat, now after seeing their real strength with his own eyes, he cast a disdain glance at Rex.
Unlike him, Queen Dongfang felt uneasy, her eyes were locked onto the crow whose neck she just broke.
'It doesn't have bones?' She thought.
..Clap.. x 3
Both of them heard the clapping sound and looked at Rex who didn't look the least bit worried about the three crows' death.
"Good performance, as expected of two experts from Azure Empire, now it's time for round two," Rex said in a praising tone, when he finished speaking, they felt something was wrong and looked at the 'dead' crows.
The bodies of all three crows went through a sudden metamorphosis, they distorted like clay status that came in contact with excess water, they saw the bodies of the crows breaking down in tiny squishy worm-like creatures then again reforming into another shape.
"Quickly kill them," Queen Dongfang reacted, she reminded the dazed Tai Qiu and herself used the Earth Law to crush all those insects at once. The fist grabbing the deforming crow turned into a sphere sealing the insects inside.
Tai Qiu also snapped out on her reminder, he raised his spear and launched a barrage of attack on the deforming crows.
Rex was calmly observing them, he looked like he was a third party that had nothing to do with the fight.
'This woman is quick-witted, she didn't wait for the Leech to complete their transformation, though it makes almost to no difference in this fight I still need to remove this weakness of Leech in the future,' He thought. At the same time, he sent a message to Andusk.
{What are you waiting for? The main leaders are now occupied, entertain their subordinates,} (Rex)
{We are on our way chief,} (Andusk)
Queen Dongfang threw away all reservation and started to use her real strength to crush the insects inside the sphere but no matter how tightly she crushed the insects they didn't stop moving, she also had to worry about Rex who was watching from the sidelines which only made her frown deeper.
...Crack... ...Boom...
Suddenly, an irresistible force burst from the sphere, making it explode with pure strength, what came out of it was a humanoid creature, thrice as big as an adult man, having two pair of arms and a snake-like tail. A pair of crow-like wings were flapping behind it, making it fly in the air.
The Leech snarled then charged at her.
Tai Qiu had it worse than her, two similar Leech jumped out of the pit on the ground and surrounded him from two sides.
The soldiers on the ships could only watch from afar, interfering in the battle of Sky Body Formation experts was out of their capabilities.
Rex retreated back and watched everything from the sideline, the Leech was almost invincible in Middle Realm, unless a miracle occurs the duo can't win. He then noticed the Green Mantis Ship coming from afar and smiled.
He wasn't the only one, the others also saw it but they can't act without orders.
"Start the array," Queen Dongfang shouted out of nowhere.
Six figures, four men and two women came out from the group of soldiers and stood on the ship's deck in a hexagonal formation.
The second they got in the formation, they all took out a black talisman and started imbuing their Qi into it.
Suddenly, a strange formation consisting of runes arranged in a hexagonal pattern appeared on the deck of the ship.
Rex was curiously looking at the formation to see what it can do when he saw several black Qi swords appearing in the air.
The swords were made from the pure metal Qi, within a few seconds, the number of swords multiplied by thrice and it kept increasing, there were various swords of different shapes and sizes floating in the air.
Rex was surprised when he saw thousands of swords covering the night sky, if it was one of two swords they were harmless to a normal Core Breaking stage expert but once the number reaches this far, then even a Sky Body Formation stage expert had to be on alert.
'Amazing, using the coordination or six Core Breaking stage experts to harness the power rivaling an all-out attack strong enough to slaughter even a Calamity Lord, this Black Steel Kingdom lives up to its name,' Rex thought.
Tai Qiu was defending against the combined attack of two Leech, he saw active array and rejoiced.
"Dongfang, attack these two first, they are together, kill them at once," He shouted at the top of his lungs while retreating quickly to leave the range of the attack.
Queen Dongfang looked at him then at the Leech in front of her, she pointed at it and shouted.
"Kill this creature at once," She shouted loudly.
The swords moved, they first rose into the sky high above then descended towards the ground at high speed seemly targeting the creature on the ground.
Rex was watching this scene unfolding in front of him but just then, his Spider-Sense rang like crazy.
'This cunning woman...' He sneered inwardly and activated Instant Transmission, disappearing on the spot.