The battle in the sky had been ongoing for five minutes already.
The crowd of 20 thousand Epoch Core cultivators had been slowly chipped away, leaving about 19,200 of them.
Inside the swarm of high-level cultivators, the 50 maids calmly moved like a fish in the water, weaving through the constant rain of attacks.
Alaia didn't need to speak as her [Leadership Intent] allowed her thoughts to be relayed to all the maids at the same time, creating a solid information network between them.
Selena flew and used a skill to summon a towering glass shield, blocking a section of the encirclement for a few moments. "Alaia, how much time can we hold on like this? The Battle Array is very consuming."
Alaia's arm blurred as she thrust her spear five times in an instant, creating enormous explosions that sent several dozens of Epoch Core people flying, with three of them dead. "If it was before my breakthrough, we might have had to be careful, but with me as the core of the array, we can continue fighting for a few hours. As their numbers decrease, our energy consumption will also do so."
Doriel became a blur and separated for a few moments from their formation, slashing her dagger enough times in less than a second to create a wall of pitch-black crescents.
The six Epoch Core cultivators that were caught in her attack were sliced into little chunks. "How did you even manage to break through? I thought I was the closest."
Alaia pointed her spear to the sky, summoning a giant lightning bolt that alleviated the pressure the fifty maids were dealing with for a second. "I was guarding when Lady Death Empress created Young Miss's Body Cultivation Technique. The lingering energy from the event was enough to push me over the edge and allow me to break through."
Alaia quickly appeared in another part of the battlefield, blocking the combined attack of three High-level Epoch Cores and saving the life of one of the weakest maids. Then, she controlled her domain and sent three one-kilometer-long lightning dragons at them, blasting them flying.
She continued answering as her body flashed across the battlefield. "Honestly, I was lucky to be nearby. Even Lady Death Empress expressed her regret, telling me it was a shame that you all weren't nearby, or you would've had a noticeable boost in cultivation."
The maids listening came to a realization.
Leila was clashing head to head with the Garuda Patriarch, exchanging blows with relative ease while summoning waves of magma to disrupt the attacks falling onto their group. "Hey, Mister Bird, why are you still fighting? Can't you see that only your people are falling?"
The Garuda Patriarch moved quickly, using his longsword to create a crescent arc of flames that Leila easily divided with a strike from her heavy halberd.
His face sank. 'This woman is fighting me while helping the group. While this makes defeating me impossible for her, the people around are falling too fast!'
While the maids conversed, an extra 100 Epoch Cores had fallen.
Unlike other types of cultivators, Epoch Core cultivators were very valuable. Top powers usually measured the current strength of their factions by counting how many Epoch Core cultivators that power had.
So, each time he saw one Epoch Core from his power killed, his heart twitched.
The battle continued for a while, and the Garuda Patriarch finally realized that the price to pay to kill these fifty women was not worth it.
'We are already barely maintaining the 12th place in the Thirty-Three clans; if my losses here are too big, I'll fall further down the ranks.'
Thinking as such, he shouted. "Retreat!"
With his order, the thousands of Epoch Core cultivators felt as if they had heard the voice of a divine being. 'Finally!'
Fighting these fifty women was too scary. No matter what tactics they used, they were seen right through, and the fifty women would counterattack, creating an isolated small group that could be picked and killed in an instant by the strongest in the group.
Even while being the ones surrounding them, it felt that they were the ones in a cage. Their grasp over the battlefield was impeccable to the point of being abnormal.
Alaia sneered, and her body erupted with lightning bolts large enough to be called rivers of electricity. Molten craters appeared after an explosion wherever the bolts landed as Alaia pointed her spear to the sky.
"You attack as you like, and then you leave as you like? Do you think this is your house? Take this souvenir as you leave. [Thunder Emperor Punishment]."
RUMBLE!
The raging roar of thunder reverberated with the World, and in the sky, the illusory image of Alaia appeared, entirely formed by lightning.
However, this image was at least 1,000 meters tall, looking like a small mountain.
Then, under the terrified eyes of the thousands of Epoch Core cultivators, the enormous image in the sky thrust her spear downward as if it was swinging the pillar that could connect Heaven and Earth.
BOOM!
A cataclysmic explosion ensued, creating a shockwave strong enough to send a large part of the thirty million army in the distance flying.
Even Yasenia was pushed back a few tens of meters by the shockwave, and she was 20 kilometers away from the fight!
The results of her attack were catastrophic.
From the initial 20,000 Epoch Cores, only 16,000 remained, and the collateral damage to the army of 30 million numbered in the hundreds of thousands.
While, for some, it might sound like they did not do much damage, these were top powerhouses! The strongest in the entire World!
And yet, after fighting a group of 50 for around an hour, they lost 4,000 people without being able to injure a single maid heavily. Flora and the other three healing maids in their group had long healed any injuries they sustained.
After the slaughter, the maids didn't pursue them and returned to Yasenia's side.
Alaia's yellow wings and tail slowly moved as she floated before Yasenia. Then, with her at the lead, the fifty maids bowed and said in a chorus. "Young Miss, we've returned!"
Yasenia smiled and nodded. "Good job. As expected, I had nothing to worry about. You've prioritized defense and slowly chipped away their strength. I have nothing but praise for your performance."
The fifty of them straightened and smiled happily. Those maids with tails had them involuntarily wagging.
The Patriarch of the Garuda Clan shouted. "Yasenia, you will regret this!"
Alaia and the others turned around indifferently. The yellow-scaled dragon woman sneered and spoke.
Her voice twisted the air around her as lightning bolts strong enough to create small spatial rifts crackled with fearsome might.
"Patriarch of the Garuda Clan, you've committed the mistake of offending our Young Miss. You've heard our Young Miss's previous order. So, we'll give you two options."
"First, continue to fight for your life until you are ruthlessly killed and sacrifice the thousands that have come to fight with you."
"Second, step forward and deliver your head to our Young Miss by your hand and be mercifully and painlessly killed."
Alaia squinted, pointed her spear at the Garuda Patriarch, and unfeelingly spat.
"Choose."
After hearing Alaia's words, everyone was frozen.
From the moment Yasenia took a step forward to face them, it felt like their numbers, strength, and preparations were all useless as if everything should and must go by the dragon's will.
Before this fight, they could feel a chance when facing one of the strongest of the continent, the Forest Sky Empress.
However, when Yasenia made her move, the feeling of being unable to resist was prominent above anything else.
It was a sense of impotence that they hadn't experienced before.
If the opponent was strong, you could eventually win even without peak experts by tiring the other cultivator. However, what happens when the opponent's strength crosses a certain threshold?
Numbers stopped being important.
The fight between the maids and the thousands of Epoch Core Cultivators perfectly showed what these words meant!
When strength reached a certain point, it didn't matter how many "weak" people attacked the other person; the only thing they would be doing was an act similar to committing suicide.
Yasenia's presence felt like that, and Alaia's strength more so than the previous one.
An unmatched Monarch with an invincible General.
The Garuda Patriarch looked at this and regretted it. He truly regretted it. 'If she had someone with this strength by her side, why did she act weak all this time!? Who would dare provoke her if she showed the strength of that dragon woman!? Why, why, why didn't she show it previously? She has kept silent to trick us all!'
He knew that he had to escape.
Facing the fearsome fifty fairies by Yasenia's side was impossible, not even with an army of 30 million. They somehow knew that they would be throwing their bodies to their death if they dared attack.
By now, even the leaders that accompanied Yasenia were doubting themselves. 'Why did we even come? Isn't she able to solve this by herself?'
The Forest Sky Empress saw a white bead appear on the Garuda Patriarch's hand and hastily warned. "He is trying to escape!"
The man crushed the bead before the Forest Sky Empress's warning, and powerful spatial fluctuations surrounded him. "Hahaha, even if you are strong, today is not the day I die! It looks like your name will stop being Yasenia Dravory, hahaha!"
He looked at Yasenia and the others with a sneer, wanting to see frustration before he disappeared, but his eyes met with a pair of calm and serene golden slit eyes. Not to speak about any fluctuations, they were looking at him as if he was an ant struggling, not knowing that it had long fallen into the hands of a superior being.
The Garuda Patriarch frowned as his body started melding with the spatial layer and disappeared. 'Why is she so calm?'
When his thoughts finished, the space around him twisted, and he disappeared from where he stood. Feeling relaxed, he smiled and opened his eyes. 'Finally, back at home… Hm?'
However, what entered his vision made him freeze in place.
It wasn't his home; it wasn't his sect, and it wasn't even another view different from the plains where they previously stood.
He had disappeared from where he stood, and the bead activated. That was correct.
Yet, the place he stood now was not within the safety of his army.
He had appeared right in front of the fifty white-wearing maids instead of returning to his domain.
His brain couldn't comprehend how this happened, and his expression became puzzled. 'How?'
Alaia looked at him coldly and slowly extended her hand toward his right shoulder. "Ant. Who do you think you are?"
The movement of her hand appeared slow as she approached, but it felt like everything other than Alaia had frozen in place.
The reason was that she used high speed coupled with fluid movements to increase the perception of those who looked, but at the same time, making them unable to do anything to prevent her attack.
"How could someone like you even attempt to escape with Lady Tatyana's formation spread around? Ignorant creature, suffer."
Then, her hand gently touched his right shoulder.
Pat.
CRACK!
"AAARGH!"
A single pat had utterly destroyed the bones and muscles of the right side of the torso. Even the wing on his back was twisted.
The pain was so sharp that even he, as an experienced body cultivator, couldn't help but scream in agony.
With horror filling his heart, he quickly tried to use his energy to use his spatial ring and another life saving treasure. But to his absolute disbelief, his energy couldn't flow through his meridians. 'What happened? Why can't I use energy?
Alaia's pat had destroyed his muscles, bones, and meridians. Therefore, using the ring on the destroyed side's hand was impossible.
Still, he didn't have the luxury to think about that because Alaia's tender and beautiful hand reached out to his other shoulder.
Not paying attention to the convoluted expressions in the Patriarch's mind, Alaia touched his left shoulder.
Pat.
This time, he felt what happened.
With incomparable energy control, Alaia had released her high-level lightning intent into the man's body, polarizing a part of his body and allowing the destructive lightning bolts to cause havoc in the places Alaia wished.
Like a ruthless dragon having a feast, the lightning currents swirled on his left side and destroyed everything, burning him on the inside.
While he looked fine on the outside, his insides were charred black.
Alaia commented coldly, ignoring the anguished scream bursting from his throat.
"Since you dared not to accept our mercy of allowing us to kill yourself and even tried to escape, the punishment will be increased. Capture him and place the [Immortal Binding] ropes around his hands. Then, Flora will heal him and give him to Lady Kali. I'm sure Lady Kali will be delighted to have a high-level Epoch Core gift."
Kali, who was spectating from the sides, was touched and spoke softly. "Thank you, Alaia."
Alaia's cold aura mellowed as she smiled at her and bowed. "You are welcome, Lady Kali. Your happiness is our Young Miss's happiness, and we are similar to family. There is no need for thanks between us."
Kali chuckled and nodded, her tree fox tails wagging. "Okay."
Then, the fifty maids turned to look at the 30 million army, and the sea of people took a step back, scared by just a single look, as every single one of them tightly clutched their weapons with trembling hands.
While they wouldn't mind facing a strong opponent, the ones before them were Goddesses of slaughter! Fighting them was nothing but a suicidal act.