Xin Feng and Hua Mei were flying as fast as possible on mounts. They had a serious look to their face, but both of them were serious for different reasons. Xin Feng concerned about his future, while Hua Mei was worried about the possibilities of what would happen if one of them couldn't resist the charm.
After a few hours, they had reached the Divine sect. They stepped out of their mount as fast as they could and ran towards the Great elders with a look of urgency. They told them what had happened, and that the second Great elder had requested for the Supreme elders to protect the country from a calamity. Together they all went down the spiral stairs to pay a visit to the Supreme elders.
"…"
"Where are they?" Xin Feng asked in confusion when he saw nothing but an empty room. The Great elders were also confused, and didn't know what to say. After they had inspected the room for more than a few minutes, the fourth elder was the first to make an assumption.
"Perhaps… They are undergoing their tribulations."
The other Great elders who heard his assumption, nodded in agreement because it was the most logical answer they could find. The seventh Great elder had a look of joy, as he spoke in excitement, "This would mean that they have ascended simultaneously. We're blessed!"
*Sigh* "Let's not get our hopes too high… If they are indeed undergoing their tribulation, we can only hope that they all make it out alive…" The third Great elder solemnly said.
"It's fortunate that they've ascended, but it's unfortunate that they've ascended at such time." The first Great elder added.
*Sigh* "Looks like we're on our own." Xin Feng uttered in despair. He had wished for his road to power to be at the least a bit peaceful. Unfortunately, fate didn't listen to his wishes and shamelessly threw more stressful situations at him.
Without the Supreme elders to help them, they had to proceed with an own strategy. Together they began to write the details they know of, before they would formulate the steps that they had to take against ExE.
The first information they had was that the calamity begins with the turned disciples of the Astral projection sect. They didn't know about the Seven Soaring Swords sect and the others that Duso Wen took care of, but they knew that the best approach was to use mental attacks to knock out the turned ones as fast as they could. Killing them was their last option, because they would lose potential friendlies and receive injuries while ExE would have a greater advantage with his already existing army.
The first step that they decided to go with was to check if the Seven Soaring Swords sect was affected by ExE's charm. The second step would be based on the results of the first. If they were charmed as well, they would have to take the stealthy approach and recover small groups of charmed ones. If they weren't, it would make things easier and they would have more allies as well.
There was also a third step, which depended on the approach of ExE. If he went aggressive on them and tried to slaughter them within a day, they would surely lose. But if he was passive, and saw the situation as nothing but a game to fight the strongest warrior honorably, they would have a good chance to win.
The main point of the plan was to bring everyone with them, elders and disciples included. The reason for that was to have a greater chance of survival if things were to get dangerous. If strong cultivators or ExE were together with all the charmed ones, they would be able to handle the stronger opponents without getting distracted due to the elders and their disciples taking care of their own opponent.
Before everyone in the sect left, the third and sixth Great elder inscribed necklaces that would help against mind control. Everyone received one to wear, and even the Great elders wore it although they knew scriptures against mind control. After all, they knew that it was better to be safe than sorry.
When they had arrived at the Seven Soaring swords, the six souring swords were already expecting them. Fortunately, none of the members of the Sword sect were affected by ExE's attack. The four overseers were soon told of the situation, and what followed after was their provision of blank necklaces and other materials. The plan was to focus on their defense first, before proceeding with offense. A wise decision when war has been declared.
...
Meanwhile in the Astral projection sect, the three were still fighting. Duso Wen's attacks were able to hit ExE, but it wasn't critical. There was a deep scar on his left arm and his chest, because he was able to change the course of the attack by tilting the sword strikes away from his critical area with the use of his own blood. The problem for Duso Wen, was that ExE had perfect control over his own blood. This meant that the wounds that he had inflicted, wouldn't make ExE die from bleeding. Duso Wen didn't despair though, because he knew that those wounds would at least hinder ExE's movements.
ExE flew up high in the air, as he opened his arms with a look of pleasure. A large stream of blood flew from the red moon as it began covering the entire body of him. The blood got absorbed by him as his wounds got closed. He left a few gallons of blood left floating around him, which he made into thinner streams that spun around him in a rapid motion.
"HAHAHAHAHA!"
"Are you finally losing hope?!" He ridiculed as he floated downwards slowly to show dominance with his body that was brimming with power and the surrounding blood that could heal him at any time.
"You f8cking piece of sh8t!"
"Just die!" Duso Wen yelled in frustration. He used his sword to charge in the direction of ExE, while spreading the telepathic energy around his body to stay afloat and fly with the sword without any resistance. ExE shot bullets that were made from the blood around him by willing it to turn into very solid and sharp darts.
The bullets were dodged gracefully by Duso Wen, and within a quarter of a second, he had decreased their distance. He then hacked his sword at ExE's neck, but got parried and struck with a blood bullet. Like a berserker he kept going with his chains of attacks even when gets injured in return. He was able to land some attacks, but the price for it was too high. The front of his body had twelve holes in it, and ExE had in return four more sword cuts on his body.
"Foolish human..." ExE uttered as he made the blood that had leaked out of Duso Wen's body into his own.
Duso Wen backed away in an instant when he saw that the blood that came out of his body was able to become a weapon of the enemy.
"You think that you're the only one who can regenerate...?" Duso Wen's spoke with his voice amplified.
When he had finished his spiting words to get even with ExE, he swallowed a pill that was able to bring his body back in good shape within two seconds.
"YOU!"
"You cheating bastard!"
ExE shot a rain of bullets upwards before throwing them down to make it impossible for Duso Wen to dodge. What Duso Wen did to counter his attack, was something that he did not expect. Instead of a godly technique to block the attack or phase through it, he flew all the way back until he was out of reach.
"YOU COWARD!!"
"Come back here!"
'These pills are going to affect my cultivation progress, but if I don't take them, I'll die...' Duso Wen who had some time left before ExE would arrive, made the decision to take the risk of increasing his cultivation level with pills.
After he had consumed the entire bottle that had around thirteen pills, he soured from body assimilation stage 7 all the way to being an ascended cultivator. It was something he did not expect. After all, the pills should've boosted his cultivation realm with only one or two levels, since there was a certain number of pills a consumer could consume before the effects became useless. The dantians would simply become resistant to the intoxicating effects of the pills that upgrades it, and it would ignore it.
Perhaps due to a miracle or because his body was a bit too special, but he was able to absorb a bit more of the intoxicating effects and continue upgrading his dantians until they had turned into one of deities.
"Impossible!" ExE roared as he felt the rise of power. He was already near, close enough to pounce on him. But all of a sudden, Duso Wen's body shone as bright as the sun before disappearing into oblivion.
"Ascension…" The Great elder who was staring from a distance, muttered.
When Duso Wen had flickered into the distance, he couldn't provide his buffs anymore because he was too far. Hence why, he decided to stay there and wait for the outcome. He was a mere soul awakening cultivator, and couldn't do much in a battle between a being that had the power of a deity and another who was almost one.
To be safe, he held a teleportation talisman incase things go too south. Things didn't go south, but it was definitely not safe for him after Duso Wen had vanished for his tribulations. Knowing the potential dangers, he immediately went and activated his talisman. He was a tad bit late though, because ExE flew towards him faster than he could even blink. ExE had grabbed him by his neck, and started slamming him at the ground to vent his anger.
"WHERE IS HE?!" He demanded aggressively as he put more pressure on the Great elder's neck.
*Cough* "Are you dumb?" *Cough* "He's facing a trial to become stronger than you…"
"Hehe… You're dead if he survives his trials." *Cough* The great elder struggled to utter before he was finally able to teleport away after struggling so much.
"ARGhh!" ExE couldn't become more furious when another prey of his slipped away from his hands. He didn't understand the skills of those humans, and was mad at how annoying they were. From the lifetime he spent with his loyal followers, he couldn't connect their methods and skills together with the humans he had fought today.
"That human again! He got out of my grasp!"
"Rahh! He's going to ruin everything again!"
"Kill every living thing you find!" His command echoed throughout the entire sect. The mountain that had all the buildings on it crushed flat to the ground, got ruined even more by the rampage of ExE. He went in a complete state of berserk until the entire sect had turned into nothing but a dead zone with nothing but craters and crumbles of rocks.
Many of the weaker ones that were under the control of ExE, were killed by beasts that overpowered them. The reason for this was because they acted by themselves and only followed the command to kill everything that wasn't under their master's control.
ExE didn't care, because he was focused on releasing his frustrations and because they were actually doing what he wanted them to do… Which was to spill blood. His plans were going as he wanted it to, because with every hour, more blood had been spilled to be touched by the air.
After his launch of plans, he would grow stronger each day with fresh blood. And when he's full, he would command his subordinates to slow down, as he needed to digest all that blood. He didn't treat them as his followers, and left them by themselves to survive on their own. After all, his followers had drunk his blood before to become a part of him, and are now also his own creations.