Water clashed against ice in a ferocious collision that exploded into a semi frozen glacier. The winter goddess glared at the sea dragon for a few seconds before her expression turned into abject horror. The blue aura that was the sea dragon crashed upon the white aura of the winter goddess and devoured her in one snap of its jaws, obliterating the Celestial Blizzard in one bite.
"Impossible!" Long Fan Xue shouted in disbelief, but Myria had no interest listening to her whine. She was already at her opponent's front, slashing with her legendary treasure sword. The latter deflected the blow desperately, only to stumble. Gritting her teeth, she stomped on the ground to produce an eruption of jagged icicles to impale her advancing foe. "Don't get too carried away!"
Myria didn't deign to reply, instead using her actions to speak for her. Flowing water smashed the icicles to shards and whirled around Long Fan Xue, who cleaved the tide apart with a flick of her sword. She raised her blade just in time to parry Myria's strike, and both girls sprang apart in a shower of sparks.
However, Myria clearly had the upper hand for now. Having overcome Long Fan Xue's Celestial Blizzard, she directed her water dragon at her opponent, who found herself caught in a whirlpool. With a shriek, Long Fan Xue froze the whirlpool and shattered it, only for Myria's blade to find her chest.
"As if I'll let you!"
With a determined yell, Long Fan Xue smacked Myria's sword away and closed in triumphantly, only for the latter to duck her counterattack and retaliate with a kick. Long Fan Xue doubled over when Myria's foot plowed into her midriff and she hurtled away, blood spurting from her mouth.
Without wasting time, Myria delivered several crushing jets of water from the heavens, splashing Long Fan Xue's position. Gritting her teeth, the dark-haired beauty swung her sword in reflex and froze half of the falling torrents, but the remainder plunged into her, engulfing her in a suffocating tsunami. Unlike me, Long Fan Xue hadn't learned the Atlantean breathing technique, and Myria was certainly in no mood to teach her. She flailed about as she drowned, desperately trying to break free of the water to gasp for air.
Her eyes blazed furiously and she attempted to freeze the giant bubble of water, but the moment she shattered the frozen sphere, Myria had replaced the ice with more of the cerulean waterfall from above, washing Long Fan Xue's position once more. Finding herself swept away by the tide, Long Fan Xue dug her sword into the ground to hold still, but she realized she wouldn't be able to maintain her consciousness for long before she blacked out from the lack of oxygen.
Not that Myria planned on dragging this out. Clenching her free hand into a fist, she transformed the newly formed bubble of water into a dragon, its jaws clamping shut with crushing force. Long Fan Xue shrieked silently, foam streaming from her mouth as she thrashed about. And then she finally fainted.
When she came to, opening her eyes groggily, the first thing she saw was Myria's blade pointed straight at her throat.
"Yield," the Atlantean princess commanded. Long Fan Xue gnashed her teeth in frustration, but knew that she had lost. So she bowed her head in submission. Satisfied, Myria withdrew her sword and turned away. With a grin, she waved at me. "Jun Wen! I won!"
"Well done," I said, only for my eyes to widen when I spotted Long Fan Xue's sneak attack. Contrary to her surrender, she was far from done. Instead, she snatched up her sword and thrust it forward, intending to murder Myria by stabbing her in the back. before I could shout out a warning, though, Myria ducked under the sneak attack, raising her sword to slightly deflect the lethal blade upward. Whilring around, she kicked Long Fan Xue in the solar plexus and sent her flying.
Long Fan Xue doubled over and spat out another mouthful of blood, even as everyone in the vicinity heard the resounding crack of bones breaking. A few ribs, maybe? But well deserved, given what she had just pulled.
"YOU BITCH!"
Bellowing in anger, Long Zhuo Fan leaped onto the stage and hurtled toward Myria like a speeding bullet, his hands glowing with murderous qi. Before he could reach her, though, a gigantic palm descended upon him, pulverizing the patriarch.
The Asura statue loomed over the stage, its stone-sculpted eyes blazing in fury. I shook my head in disgust. "As expected of the Long family. You guys all have the same pattern. Whether it's Long Shou Shi or Long Fan Xue, you refuse to accept defeat and launch a sneak attack from behind. And the fathers only know how to ambush the victors after their children's defeat. This must be the true colors of the Long family."
"That's right! How shameless!"
"Admit defeat like a real cultivator! Where's your sportsmanship? Where's your honor? You tarnish the reputation of all of us cultivators!"
"Is this what the Long family is really like? A bunch of sore losers who can't accept losses?"
"If you can't afford to lose, then don't challenge other people in the first place! Don't bother holding this stupid trial and forcing people into engagements!"
"Hell, don't steal other people's fiancés!"
Even better, there were a few cultivators who had filmed the whole thing and streamed it online, uploading it to social media. Already, the water army of Hua Xia were flooding the live chat with comments, deriding the Long family.
Unfortunately, the crisis was far from over. The hand of the Asura statue froze, turning into ice, and Long Zhuo Fan burst out in an icy inferno of qi. The Asura statue stumbled back, but tried to kick, only for Long Zhuo Fan to meet the gigantic foot with a palm. There was another thunderous crack, and the whole leg turned into ice before shattering.
With a groan, the almost twenty-meter high Asura statue toppled over, no longer having a leg to support it.
"No matter what, I'll kill you for the humiliation you caused my daughter!" Long Zhuo Fan yelled at Myria and charged once more.
"Is this how the Long family behaves?" Myria retorted calmly, refusing to budge. "If you lose, you kill the victor to hide the shame of your defeat?"
"It's the rule of the strong! Blame yourself for not having the backing of a powerful family! In this world, strength is EVERYTHING!"
What is with all these morons and their "strength eat the weak" bullshit? If they truly bought into that rhetoric, then Long Zhuo Fan should accept it as natural that his daughter lost to Myria because she was weaker, no? but he didn't care about logic, he only cared about justifying vengeance for his daughter.
"Hah! This is the difference between us!" Despite her pain, Long Fan Xue crowed arrogantly. "You might be stronger, but you don't have the same social status as me! The same pedigree or family backing! Or wealth! You are just TRASH!"
Good lord, I wanted to bury my face in my palm at their extreme ignorance and delusions. Nonetheless, I couldn't afford to lose focus, not when Long Zhuo Fan was bearing down on Myria. The other three Asura statues reacted to my command, swinging their fierce weapons in unison. The demon swung a scimitar, the dragon thrust its spear and the serpent struck with a trident.
Even the patriarch of the Long family couldn't avoid all three weapons in time, his body disappearing under the colossal impact that sent reverberations across the arena. A few seconds later, though, the weapons all froze and shattered. A bloodied Long Zhuo Fan emerged from the converged point of contact and soared high above, his freezing qi blazing ferociously. With a roar, he swung both hands and conjured a Celestial Blizzard that was incomparable in scale to the one his daughter had cast before.
The entire courtyard was immediately frozen. The spectators yelped and cursed as they scattered, drawing their qi to protect themselves from the chill. Myria raised her sword, the relic blade absorbing the icy qi and allowing her to weather the worst of the technique. As expected of an ancient weapon capable of sealing the Deep Sea King.
The Asura statues were not so lucky, however. Having borne the full brunt of Long Zhuo Fan's rage, they had turned into frozen sculptures. The patriarch swept his arm across the stage, and they fell apart, tumbling as thousands of frozen fragments across the snowy courtyard.
"It doesn't matter how you controlled the Long family's Asura guardians!" Long Zhuo Fan snarled. "Nothing will stop me from slaying that vixen! And you will not be leaving here, Song Jun Wen! Even if I have to cripple you, you will give my daughter children!"
What the hell was he talking about now? What kind of father would want a random guy to make his daughter pregnant?
-Does the user recall the time when Long Fan Xue apologized to you back during high school, before you recovered your cultivation? –
"Huh? Yeah. What about it?"
-It was at that time when Long Zhuo Fan realized your potential and desired your genes. They never really cared about you recovering your cultivation, they simply wanted the user's genes to sire children with greater potential in cultivating the water and ice element, to raise the Long family's status. –
Oh, I understood. That was why Long Fan Xue apologized to me, in an attempt to reconcile and create positive feelings, so that I wouldn't mind marrying her in future. and here I thought she was being sincere. They were only beginning to disgust me even more.
"You don't need your limbs to sire children! As long as we have that thing, it doesn't matter if I cripple you or cut off your hands and legs! You will be a stud for the Long family! As for your ex-fiancée, she's dead! We will eliminate anyone who gets in the way of the Long family! This is what it means to be strong! Might makes right! Since you guys are weak, you just have to suck it up and obey us!"
Man, this guy was really deluded. That said, he was the real thing. Four Earth ranked Asura statues, and he annihilated them in short order. Despite the crisis, I couldn't help but be impressed. Honestly, there was no way I could defeat him.
But that wasn't my goal. I had bought more than enough time for someone else who could.
"Insolent!"
Someone rushed into the Long family's manor, and with a single stroke, he obliterated Long Zhuo Fan's freezing aura and neutralized his technique. The Long family patriarch staggered, holding his bleeding arm as he spat out a wad of blood.
"How dare you…?!" He trailed off when he saw the newcomer.
And the newcomer was not alone.
A military regiment of cultivators descended to form ranks between Myria and a stupefied Long Zhuo Fan. The newcomer himself was none other than General Jiang, the polished stars of his epaulets gleaming brightly. The qi he exuded surpassed that of Long Zhuo Fan, and the soldiers far outstripped the Long clan's retainers in strength.
That wasn't counting the participants of the trial, who were up in arms and ready to defend Myria. They had rallied behind me when they saw the Asura statues fall, but we all knew we wouldn't be a match. Now that we saw the military had arrived, we relaxed a little.
"Why is the military here?" Long Fan Xue demanded. Her father was no less shocked, but he was also outraged.
"You have no right to be here, General Jiang! This is the Long family's manor. You are trespassing on private property! And the military has no right to intervene in civilian matters!"
"You might be right…except that her highness is no ordinary civilian." General Jiang glared at Long Fan Xue. "What do you think you're trying to do to a foreign dignitary? Are you trying to murder her highness in the territory of Hua Xia? Do you wish to spark a war? How will you handle the responsibility for that?"
"What? Her highness? Foreign dignitary? War?" Long Zhuo Fan spluttered. "What are you talking about?!"
"Her highness Myria Poseidon is a princess from a foreign country," Jiang explained stiffly. "As such, we have been charged with protecting her while she learns our culture. It is a good thing the men I dispatched to watch over her alerted me of your insidious schemes, otherwise Hua Xia might really end up going to war!"
"What do you mean princess?!" Long Fan Xue hollered, refusing to believe what she was hearing. She jabbed a finger at Myria, who looked unfazed by her rudeness. "Which country's princess is she?!"
"Are you worthy enough to know?" Jiang sneered. Long Fan Xue looked as if she had just been slapped. She sank to her knees, turning ghostly pale. All those insults and condescending remarks, contemptuously looking down on Myria as if she was of a higher status…only to find out that she was the real clown for behaving arrogantly in front of a REAL princess.
"No way. This can't be true. This has to be a nightmare…"
"How do you want to deal with this matter, your highness?" Jiang asked Myria. She shrugged, and his jaw tightened. "We will definitely offer you a satisfactory settlement for this."
"I'm safe. My fiancé is also safe. That's all that matters. Handle it as you see fit."
"Understood." Jiang considered for a moment, and then he hardened his expression. "The Long family will cease to exist from this day onward."
"You…you dare?!" Long Zhuo Fan shouted. Jiang turned to glare at him.
"You were the ones who dared to murder a foreign princess first. That's more than enough grounds for me to deliver you the death penalty and summarily execute you on the spot."
"You…you can't!" Long Fan Xue protested. "You can't just kill us! That's against the law!"
"Who said anything about killing?" Myria asked. Everyone turned to her, but her gaze was focused on General Jiang. "You just have to make the Long family no longer exist. that means erasing their social status, confiscating their wealth and ensuring justice is served. No one has to die." She snorted. "We live in a modern era. Who the hell resorts to killing over every little thing? What is this, an ancient cultivator story full of murder hobos? Stop being so childish. The law exists for a reason. Use it."
"Understood, your highness." Jiang saluted. He gestured for one of his soldiers to come forward and take notes. "We will make sure to press legal charges against the Long family…and as you say, from this day onward, they will lose all of their status and wealth. I hope you are satisfied with this resolution, your highness."
He really was treading on eggshells with her. Myria, though, didn't seem like she cared that much. She nodded nonchalantly.
"Sure. Do whatever you see fit. I'll leave everything to you."
The last thing I saw of the Long family was them being rounded up by the military and herded into their vehicles, driven off to some prison where they would reside for the rest of their lives.