Yun Jhin's energy started to fluctuate as he broke through to the second stage of the ki cultivating realm, his ki amount increased and its purity did the same, his eyes glowed with a peculiar red-black color as his body under his normal disguise got some changes. His claws strengthened as did his skin which took a darker shade of grey.
Yun Jhin made sure his internal situation was ok as he used the remaining nutrients and ki from the bodies to stabilize himself in the second stage of the ki cultivating realm, however from all he did his main body was still at the 5th stage, however, with a little bit of luck he would break through to the 6th stage in a few weeks.
Yun Jhin looked around and found that no one was spying on him with his soul willpower, then he started running towards the battlefield at his fastest speed, it took him almost 3 days to break through and stabilize his body, it was fortunate the Heavenly Turtle sect thought that the elder and the woman would be enough to tie and maybe even kill the whole squad of generals.
However, by now they should have realized they are both dead as they didn't report in a long while. Yun Jhin ran towards the battlefield at his quickest speed as he finally left the forest, in front of him appeared a battlefield full of dead bodies, some were burnt some decapitated and some cut in two.
Some of them were diced into small bits and some of them were just ashes, as Yun Jhin looked around he licked his lips as he felt the abundant death ki around and took in a deep breath as the ki entered his body it started to swell up then deflate a few seconds later.
He looked around and realized that the fight was pretty equal between the empire, kingdom, and sect, Mono was tying with a 5th level ki cultivator and making sure he didn't attack the lower leveled cultivators while the low-leveled ones were fighting to the death.
Yun Jhin looked from afar and then jumped directly into the battlefield! His attacks were swift and without mercy, as he plucked heads and hearts on the battlefield, his hands were fast precise and deadly as he dealt with a multitude of heavenly realm peak elites, he even one shot 1st stage ki cultivating experts if they got too close to him.
From time to time, pieces of meat would end up in his mouth as he would swallow them, diced meat, whole heads, or even hearts that he would extract from the enemies, the others were too distracted to realize what he was doing or they would have become disgusted and scared of him long ago.
Only Mono realized what Yun Jhin was doing but the prince also said that eating corpses would further his cultivation, even though this type of cultivation was frowned upon in most kingdoms the Long Empire accepted anyone regardless of cultivation technique or origins as long as they were loyal.
However, that meant some bad apples would appear here and there, as long as their cultivation got high enough they would surely strike back towards the empire regardless of how they were treated. And Yun Jhin was one of those apples, however, unlike the others, he knew how to act before his power was enough.
Yun Jhin's smile widened as he massacred one soldier after another until he met with a stage 3 cultivator who punched him in the stomach and threw him away while he had a great time.
Yun Jhin frowned as he put a hand over his stomach as he got up from the ground, the ground under him broke into splinters as his immense speed propelled him directly into the man's face and broke his jaw, he let his guard down thinking no one could disturb him while the 5th stage cultivator was taken care of.
Technically speaking it was the truth, the punch from the 3rd stage guy made him take no damage and only enraged him, Yun Jhin's hand immediately went to his head as he cracked it at weird angle immediately killing him, he opened his jaw like a whale and inhaled the corpse.
All the others finally saw what he did and looked at him with fear in their eyes, even his allies were perturbed and backed away from him, Yun Jhin ignored them and continued to attack the alliance of the Earth Kingdom and the Heavenly turtle sect as they pushed them out of the battlefield.
Mono was having a hard time with his opponent but then he shook his head as he unsheathed one sword from his back and said:
"One sword style: darkness slash."
He appeared behind his opponent as a shower of blood splurted upwards from the man's chest. As Yun Jhin took a better look at the man he saw his features, he was a brutish man with an extreme amount of bodily hair, his hair was done into an afro and his thick dark skin showed he was a foreigner, he had an afro as his hairstyle and he fought aggressively, even though he took a head-on hit from Mono's darkness slash attack it only made him spurt blood as the wound quickly closed itself.
Yun Jhin frowned as he looked over and thought to himself:
"It's a beast physique but which one? bear? leopard? lion?"
Yun Jhin took a better look at the man and saw how his muscles bulged up from time to time and how his ki enveloped him to increase his physical strength and he realized that he had a bear beast physique, some physiques needed you to have a constitution to be developed while others you were just born with, bear physiques gave you innate strength since the moment you were born.
Yun Jhin knew Mono wouldn't be able to defeat him easily as his self-regeneration abilities and defense were too much for a normal human cultivator without any bloodline or constitutions like him.
However Yun Jhin's eyes widened as he saw Mono draw out his other sword, a different air appeared around him as he kept his swords around his body, he looked like a predator ready to hunt, even the afro guy started to frown, he could feel that Mono's aura changed somewhat after he unsheathed his second sword, he defended himself as he watched Mono charge at him.
Suddenly Mono started to flicker around the battlefield as after images of him appeared, his swords multiplied somehow as he struck the man in 5 places at the same time, lungs spleen heart neck and spine.
The man looked down at his chest as he saw it spurting with a huge amount of blood then he retreated slowly to the back, Mono breathed hardly as the technique took a lot of ki out of him.
However unluckily for him, the man wasn't finished yet!
The man's hands turned into bear paws as he swatted Mono away, then he looked down at his body that spurted blood from time to time and decisively ran away!
He knew that even though he could kill Mono, he could be teamed upon latter by the others and killed as well, he didn't want to give his life to take all of the others down with him so he ran away!
Yun Jhin looked at his receding figure as he ran away quickly from the plains where the battlefield was. He knew that he couldn't follow the man, even though he was injured he was at the 5th stage and he would defeat him even when injured, he might be able to kill the man but in the end, he would lose this host body which wasn't worth it.
Yun Jhin quickly ran towards Mono and supported him, he wanted to eat the man but he still needed him later, also his body wouldn't be able to break through again so fast, he would need a while for the body to adapt to the second stage, even though he ate many people on the battlefield they weren't enough to get to the 3rd stage, he was halfway there because he ate one third stage expert, he would need atleast 2 or 3 more before he could advance again, and that's after his body adapted.
Mono got up and patted Yun Jhin on the back as he saw how he was cached in blood and ashes from the fight, however, all the blood wasn't Yun Jhin's, Mono nodded at Yun Jhin and said:
"You did a good job, thanks for the help here, *sigh* it's good that he ran away, I was betting on him being too scared to continue fighting and I won, let's clean up."
The other enemies were immediately taken care of as their leader ran away, even though some ran away they were only weaklings. Yun Jhin walked inside the newly risen tent where Mono was resting as he said immediately:
"You should know why I'm here general Mono."
Mono stood up from his cross-legged position on the mat and he said:
"You can have the 1st stage ki cultivating bodies, for 2nd stage and above I cannot give them to you unless you want to use your military merit to them, they are useful to the empire as well."
As Yun Jhin would fight in more such skirmishes as the war wasn't even halfway done he didn't more bodies, he was content with getting the 1st stage ki cultivators, with them he would be 75% on the way to the 3rd stage.
Yun Jhin bowed to Mono but before he could leave Mono stopped him as he said:
"Good job out there Sisheng, I see why the second prince recommended you, his party might be revived with you at the helm!"
Yun Jhin laughed slowly as he shook his head as he said:
"Maybe it will, who knows?"
Mono didn't know what he meant by those words but he joined in the laughter and said:
"You can go now, I have to rest to recover my ki, we will move 3 days from now, you should go and rest as well, we need all of you to be at full capacity before we move to the next battlefield."
Yun Jhin nodded his head but he stopped mere centimeters before he left the tent and said:
"About the 1st stage ki bodies.. can I eat those that were on our side as well?"
Mono frowned as he looked at Yun Jhin and said:
"I.. can let you but your reputation among the soldiers will take a huge hit, they already fear you but now they will hate you as well if you do that."
Yun Jhin shook his head as he left the tent and then went to eat the bodies, the men that looked at him were disgusted to the point some even vomited and when his hands went towards his 'comrades' bodies some shouted at him and said:
"What are you doing?!"
Yun Jhin looked at the man coldly and said:
"Ask general Mono, he should give you a good explanation."
The man feared Yun Jhin too much to do anything else besides shouting once at him and backed off, but the others looked at Yun Jhin with hatred in their eyes now, some of them were even planning to let him die on the next battlefield, it was one thing to be so arrogant but to eat the bodies of your comrades?
Some of them were cursing him under their breath as a monster or a demon and pervert. But Yun Jhin ignored them as he feasted with a giant grin on his face, which disturbed the others even more.
Mono shook his head as he felt what happened outside with his soul willpower and said to himself:
"You are a weird one, but atleast you are reliable, you are lucky you were born in the Long Empire."
He sighed as he looked down at the pendant that hanged at his neck, he gritted his teeth and clutched it in his hand before he made sure it was hidden. Then he went back to restoring his ki.
Yun Jhin finished eating and burped loudly letting out an acidic gas that almost broke down the skin of some unlucky fellows that were in the way, he laughed to himself as he left towards his tent while patting his stomach.
Yun Jhin got back into his tent and his satisfied look transformed into a cold one as he muttered:
"This act should make them fear me enough, combined with their prior lack of knowledge this personality should be good enough to put them on a tight leash."
Yun Jhin nodded to himself as he sat on the ground and started to do his breathing exercises slowly to help his body adapt quickly to the second stage of the ki cultivating realm. With all the extra bodies from his 'comrades', he was ready to break through again with his host's body. As for his main body, it was a hair away from breaking through the 6th stage!