The final battle between the Blood Sect and Ki's small group resulted in a swift defeat of those of the Blood Sect along with the captive mercenary leader.
The mercenary leader had been listed as a problematic person who had committed many evil acts because of his own self interest and his growing arrogance.
Even if tamed and controlled, Ki did not feel comfortable having someone like him among her own people.
One small outburst from him could claim many lives and she could not be there all the time to monitor or stop him.
He is also someone who is known for going back on his word so there was also the very high probability that he would flee the first chance he got.
It had been long decided that no rescue was needed for this task and lethal means could be used.
This also reduced the risks of having casualties on her own side just to save one or several people.
So after the task had been completed and the blood belonging to everyone within the room had been collected, Ki and her team left behind the dead bodies and the room full of poisonous smoke.
If the poison still remained within the room and did not disperse then it would soon become a deadly weapon against anyone who tried to gain entry into that room upon discovering anything wrong.
In the previous bases, Ki had left a couple of traps for those entering just to hurt them a little more before she left just so she could cause additional damages to their forces.
Although this would only be a small portion of the strength and numbers that they possessed, the damage that she had done and would continue to do would hurt them enough to make them desperate enough to find the culprit.
In another location was a clan that belonged to a special and unique type of martial arts path but it was not a part of or recognised by any of the larger influences like the Martial Alliance or the Unorthodox Sect.
Everyone believed in strength and practical skills to win battles so they only recognised those that fell in line with those views and disregarded the others as mere tricks or theatrics that can only be used to entertain others.
The clan was once called the Sound Clan and practiced a martial art style that branched out from wind arts to create their own style of fighting by using sound as a weapon.
By infusing their qi into their weapon or voice they are able to disrupt others during combat by releasing a piercing scream or roar, or a certain song send out an shockwave effect or affect the persons emotions depending on their mastery and the path they had chosen to train in.
They can also use their qi upon their instruments to pluck at the strings of a stringed instrument and send out attacks similar to wind, air or sound based slicing or cutting attacks but if another instrument type is used the attack styles may vary.
Perhaps the characteristic that would probably best describe their attacks would be sound or shockwaves that are created from their voice, the sound of a string, the crash of a drum or the clash of a weapon against another to add an additional invisible attack.
Their skills may be deadly to be able to kill others from far away, affect their enemies during combat or even assassinate others through various means but their own style has never been acknowledged by others and regained the recognition that it should.
Their clan had long been looked down upon and even their Unrestrained or Mystic realm masters could not change how others looked at them.
Many still looked down upon them even to this day and treated them as a clan of entertainers, instead of looking for them to assist with important matters they faced humiliating requests to put on performances for those who considered themselves their betters not knowing that the Sound Clan or at least the most accomplished people among them, if provoked could end their lives with a couple of plucks from their instrument when they all let down their guard expecting to be immersed in the music and the festivities they were to be enjoying.
However to keep fighting for their place in the world, they remained stubborn and continued to keep their pride even with the opinions of others knocking them.
Much like the Bombyx family, they had continued to survive and knew well how to preserve the bloodline of the clan while honing their skills to perfection throughout many hundreds and thousands of years even if that meant holding in the pain and torment from having their pride wounded time and time again.
The clan had not been able to produce a Mystic realm powerhouse among them for around a hundred years now and their clan was declining and reaching its lowest point in a long time.
Their most talented person among them was the current clan head who had taken over after her father.
She had married a husband from another influential noble clan, many years back her father had passed away just as she was busy with her pregnancy and giving birth to her children.
She always maintained a good relationship with her relatives and aimed to make live up to making the Sound Clan great again.