PtM Book 17 - Chapter 23: Cha Ming vs Thunderclash

Hm, in hindsight 2 chapters is on the low side this week. 2/3 this week. I'll post another one in a couple of days, and that will finish up this confrontation.

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The match to decide the leadership of the Puppet Lightning Sect was all but over. Four out of five members of each side had defeated, making this a technical draw, but the two leaders that mattered from the sinful faction were dead. Even with Dao God Thunderclash, it would be difficult for them to assume leadership if they clinched the last the fight.

The battle was now merely a formality, but for Cha Ming, it held more weight then the rest of the leadership challenge. For one, the winner of this match would become the Warden of the Puppet Lightning Region and have a heavy hand in its future. As for the loser, even if he survived the fight, he would be exiled from the region and be unable to return.

“I told Blood Seal you were trouble, you know,” Thunderclash said, unstrapping the violet sword of lighting from his back. Lightning pooled on the stage as he held it point down. “Your cultivation isn’t much, but you’re one of the few who’s managed to suppress his cultivation until now. You are a wild card, one that can’t be recruited. The best option for a case like yours is early elimination.”

“I think it’s too late for regrets, Thunderclash,” Cha Ming said. “And it’s not like Blood Seal didn’t try to kill me. I barely escaped him with my life.”

“It is too late for regrets,” Thunderclash agreed. “Only one of us is going to leave this stage.” He pulled out an item from his storage ring. To Cha Ming’s surprise, it was as contract. Thunderclash bit his thumb and signed it in blood before tossing it over. “I don’t want any surprises. Accept if you dare.”

Cha Ming did not hesitate. He signed the contract in blood, and it exploded into motes of golden light that shot into their spiritual seas. Karmic bindings fasten around Cha Ming’s soul, and the same happened to Dao God Thunderclash. Regardless of who won the match by technically, both would be compelled to fight until the other was dead.

Dao God Thunderclash was no amateur, despite his weaker fundamentals. He was a genius from the Heartforge Realm. His hands flashed like lightning as his fox-shaped puppet lighting spirit growled a command.

The three guardian puppets moved out to encircle Cha Ming. One almost managed to catch him before he took a Clear Rune Step out of harms way.

“You’re not the only one with a high tier lighting spirit,” Cha Ming said. Luther appeared beside him, fur erect and hissing. “Do the thing!”

“Fine, fine,” said Luther. “Just don’t expect this to be easy. I’ll be sealing off my senses as I work, so you don’t accidentally bother me.”

The lighting soul didn’t even give Cha Ming a chance to protest. It split itself into three and began to wrestle with the opposing fox for control. Ultimately, both lightning spirits chose to jump into the guardian puppets, rendering them immobile.

Luther, how long will this take you? Cha Ming sent to the puppet lighting soul. His senses hit a wall, and he realized that Luther had done exactly as he said he would. He’d cut off even spiritual communication. Oh come on, you basically birthed that Tier 1 spirit. You don’t expect me to believe this is going to be difficult, do you?Once again, he received no answer.

Cha Ming could only conclude that the lightning soul was doing this on purpose. He resolved to teach it a lesson once everything was over.

Regardless, the puppets were directly taken out of the equation. Dao God Thunderclash was surprised but not without options. He tightened his grip on his lighting blade, then erupted with power. His silver armor glowed with violet runes, and a single pair of devilish wings appeared on his back.

“Just one pair of wings?” Cha Ming mocked. “Weak.” His own wings appeared, one glowing with energy, another dim, and third pair little more than a shadow.

“Your injured soul isn’t very frightening either,” Thunderclash replied. Then he vanished, and Cha Ming heard a soft crackling noise. Thunderclash’s greatsword came down from behind Cha Ming, forcing him to call out his staff at an awkward angle and retaliate in kind.

Three forms of energy merged together - divine energy, domain energy, and spiritual energy, sixty percent of which was now fused ten-colored energy. All three staff projections struck Thunderclash’s greatsword simultaneously.

Cha Ming was ill-prepared for this attack; his bones creaked as the stage shattered, sending up a cloud of dust that blocked them from view. He activated Clear Rune Transformation and filled the stage with a Clear Rune Field.

When Thunderclash came back down for another attack, Cha Ming stepped beside him and struck out with another Three-Fold Crush. This time, both of them were forced backwards to opposite ends of the stage.

“Not bad,” Thunderclash said. “You’re able to meet me in direct combat despite not having broken through to law stitching and shell marking.”

“It’s difficult to bridge the gap in realms,” Cha Ming said. Thunderclash was both an initial law stitching cultivator and a shell-marking demigod. Thankfully, he hadn’t bothered trying to fuse his energies yet.

The two exchanged a few more casual strikes. They vanished and appeared at the center of the stage, matching lightning against Cha Ming’s three-fold energy. Neither of them had the advantage.

Thunderclash was both strong and fast. Though Cha Ming could teleport across the stage with Clear Rune Steps, he could only do so with zero momentum. Rapid attacks were a weakness he hadn’t yet fixed. As a lightning cultivator, Thunderclash cultivated a movement technique that made him intangible between attacks and much faster than normal.

They fell into a rhythm, where Cha Ming stepped to a random location, then vanished before Thunderclash had a chance to hit him. The battle devolved into a stalemate.

The gap between realms was difficult to breach, even with 60% of his energy fused. Cha Ming didn’t know exactly how he was able to match up with Thunderclash, but imagined it had to do with the many immortal-class techniques he cultivated.

Seventy-Two Earthly Transformations was the basis for his body cultivation. Combined with the Clear Sky World as the core of his inner universe, it wouldn’t lose out to other immortal body cultivation techniques. Add in Thirty-Six Heavenly Transformations, his self-created qi cultivation technique, the Savage Deity Battle Art, and the Divine Law Spirit Stitching Scripture… Well, it was no wonder neither of them was getting anywhere.

They both stopped as though by prior agreement. “Neither of us will win if you keep evading combat, Clear Sky,” Thunderclash said.

“I don’t remember the contract setting a time limit,” Cha Ming said.

“No matter,” said Thunderclash. “Your body is strong, but let’s see how you fight with that wounded soul of yours.”

A surge of spiritual energy leaked out from Thunderclash, combining with the lighting element and forming eight great bells. The bells tolled with frightening power that directly assaulted Cha Ming’s spiritual sea.

“Elementary,” Cha Ming said. His soul was almost completely healed, and with his Blessing of Tenacity and his fused energy, the numbing bell attacks bashed against him and ran off his spiritual sea like waves on a cliff.

Executing a spiritual attack left one open to attacks of the same kind. Cha Ming used this opening to send a tendril of his Heartforge Spirit flame into Thunderclash, forging a connection with his opponent before activating his three-fold aura full bore.

Wave after wave of soul refining energy assaulted Thunderclash’s spiritual sea. His face distorted as the flames brought agony that couldn’t be defend against. “So you know a few tricks,” he said with gritted teeth. “You think this will close the gap between us?”

“It’s a start,” Cha Ming said with a laugh. He took a step forward. Heartforge Spirit Flames sprouted inside Thunderclash spiritual sea and started burning him from the inside. He took another step, and the flames intensified; they worked their way in the weaknesses in his resolve.

“Your problem, Thunderclash, is your indecision,” Cha Ming said. “You’ve cultivated a few devilish arts, but you’ve only dabbled in them. You turned the Puppet Lightning Sect to corpse refining, but you didn’t go all the way. You tried to keep things discreet. Compared to Blood Seal, you are far too lacking.” He took another step, and Thunderclash staggered. “Your heart is weak, Thunderclash. You can’t even withstand this much pressure. Who do you think you are, picking a fight with me in my own territory?!”

Cha Ming’s words weren’t just mere taunting. When it came to clash of auras, words were power. Thunderclash’s weaknesses had been pried open by the Heartforge Spirit Flames. If the gaps grew wide enough, his combat power would fall, and he might even lose control of his own cultivation.

Thunderclash coughed out another mouthful of blood and took a few steps back before steadying himself. He used his own aura to tamp down the fire eating him from the inside. This naturally gave Cha Ming the initiative.

“Wind.” Cha Ming said, tossing out the Clear Sky Brush. He painted a scene of sky tearing winds that cut gouges into the stone stage and filled the air with tiny wind scars and maelstroms that blasted openings in Thunderclash’s armor and tore chunks from his divine body.

Cha Ming did not have access to Luther, but he drew from his power nonetheless. He painted a scenery of soul lashing rain. Clouds appeared above the stage and filled it with puddles of lightning water that filled the cracks in Thunderclash’s soul in tandem with the Heartforge Spirit Flames.

“You think something like this is enough to defeat me?” Thunderclash said. A protective shell appeared on his skin and armor, forcing back both of Cha Ming’s paintings.

He then threw up his sword into the sky, producing storm clouds that drew in lightning energy from the air. The cloud even reached Puppet Lighting Mountain and was able to take in a portion of its energy.

Lightning rained down on the stage. It was high-grade lightning, and it overwhelmed the stage’s sacred earth aspects.

“You want to use puppet lighting against me?” Cha Ming asked. He was practically immune to the stuff. The Clear Sky Brush drew in the lightning as ink and painted dozens of house cats that pounced on Thunderclash, cutting shallow gouges into his skin and armor.

Seeing that Puppet Lighting was ineffective, Thunderclash pointed up at his sword. The storm clouds changed, and a different kind of lightning, Bane Lightning, began striking down instead. Cha Ming was forced to adopt all-out evasive maneuvers.

Thunderclash began his greatsword assault anew, forcing Cha Ming to retreat. Since lightning had filled the stage, it was impossible to use Clear Rune Steps to completely evade him.

So Cha Ming improvised. He had already painted himself a body of lighting and wind, and wings of the same kind. Why couldn’t he combine them as a technique?

His body burst apart as Thunderclash cut him in two. It did not come together as usual but split into liquified wind and lighting that shot away from the angry Dao God. Cha Ming appeared a short distance away, having summoned only minor harm from the encounter.

The lightning storm was still a problem. It wasn’t a normal storm, but a formation created using Thunderclash’s soul bound treasure as a focus. It would not break down unless Cha Ming found a way to break the formation.

Thunder laws weren’t Cha Ming’s forte, but he knew that stability was very important. He painted a rendition of his Yang Memory painting with hot iridescent flames, including a single mulberry tree and a pair of phoenixes, then painted criss-crossing yin rivers atop it.

One painting was filled with heartfelt love and repressed emotions. The other painting represented yin passing, and was filled with loss and longing. The two paintings of vivid flame clashed with one another, establishing a resonance with natural laws.

“I’ll call this painting Broken Yin, Shattered Yang,” Cha Ming said to Thunderclash.  “Let’s see if your storm can withstand it.”

Yin and Yang collided, creating a combination of emotions that could only be described as heartbreak. They smashed into Thunderclash’s thunder formation, destabilizing the formation and dispelling the storm.

Thunderclash’s sword returned to his hands, but it was broken and chipped from the repeated heating and cooling.

He could only stare numbly as Cha Ming used righteous blood to paint a third scenery on the stage. Cha Ming called this one Blood Calamity Hail, and it filled the turbulent winds with shards of crystalline blood that hacked into armor and flesh and bone alike.

“You forced me,” Thunderclash said. He activated a two-layered soul burn technique. His speed, his strength, and his elemental prowess soared to a whole new level.

“Was it ever a question that we’d use soul burn techniques?” Cha Ming asked, activated his own single-layer soul-burn technique. This was a battle to the death, after all! His spiritual energy pool began to seethe, but thanks to the Divine Law Spirit Scripture, so did his divine energy, his qi, and his fused energy.

Thunderclash had been relying on his sword and strong body, but it was clear that this wouldn’t cut it. He summoned a law projection onto the battlefield, filling it with tiny runes of imprisonment. “My first law is that of the prison god,” he said. “Your movements… are not permitted!”

The moment the law was imposed, Cha Ming suddenly lost his ability to both teleport and execute Clear Rune Steps. Even dissociating into lighting and wind became impossible.

This was clearly draining for Thunderclash; he wasted no time in attacking Cha Ming, who could only fight him head on with repeated uses of Three-Fold Crush. But by now, his energy was fused; the technique barely functioned to amplify his techniques.

Thunderclash’s sword began to strike flesh, and Cha Ming’s energy stores plummeted. Cha Ming knew he had to break through these laws and fast. He activated All-Heaven’s Eye. A fuzzy representation of the law projection appeared, and he immediately spotted a few weak points.

Cha Ming had no runes or laws to attack these weak points, but he did have his paintings. He visualized Thunderclash’s prison law as though it were a painting with his minds eye and saw a clean cell with a sturdy metal door. The only weakness was a stone wall at the back.

Cha Ming didn’t have time to chip away at the stone himself, but he didn’t have to. He painted a prisoner inside the cell, and this prisoner had a story. He’d been there for seven decades and was determined to escape. Day after day he chipped, until finally, a hole into the sewers appeared, allowing him to escape. His painting had a story, and this story became law. Thunderclash’s prison law was henceforth ineffective against Cha Ming.

The sudden reversal shook Thunderclash. The Heartforge Spirit Flames in his spirit flared up at that moment, causing him a moment of great agony. Cha Ming used this opening to split up into three components.

A body of ten-colored wind and ten-colored lighting appeared. His own body glowed with ten-colored blood. The three bodies painted countless claw marks upon Thunderclash’s body. Like before, it was a painting that told a story. In this story, Thunderclash fallen into a pocket dimension filled with vicious elemental cats, and they had savaged him within an inch of his life.

By willing this painting to life, Cha Ming pitted his laws and his inner world against Thunderclash’s. If Thunderclash was in his prime, this was a foolish endeavor, but distracted as he was? Cha Ming’s painting became law.

Bone and blood and metal spewed out as Thunderclash’s body broke and remade itself repeatedly. The Heartforge Spirit Flames in his body erupted at several times their original strength. Thunderclash’s divine body began burning from the inside out.

“It’s not that you’re weaker than I am,” Cha Ming said to Thunderclash as he tried to pick himself up again and again. Wind and rain and bloody hail gnawed at his body like rats a piece of rotten flesh. “You just haven’t understood the true nature of the Heartforge Realm.” His struggles lasted a full minute before finally, all that remained were golden fragments of Thunderclash’s inner world, which Cha Ming caught and incorporated into his own.

“Daoist Clear Sky… is victorious!” Sect Master Sacred Earth announced. “The survivors may either surrender to the winning power or choose exile.” He waved his arm, and the stage crumbled, as did the golden bars surrounding it.

Luther, are you going to keep playing dead or do I need to jolt you awake? Cha Ming asked. Luther did not reply, so Cha Ming sent a surge of energy through the lightning soul’s slave seal.

A lazy cat strolled out from the puppets. They snapped to attention and handed control over to Cha Ming. Mission accomplished, Master, Luther said. I’m tired. I’m going to rest now.

You were fighting a descendant lightning spirit, Cha Ming said coldly. You could have destroyed that thing in three seconds flat. Do you think I don’t dare destroy you?

Whatever do you mean, Master? Luther said. I was simply doing as instructed.

Well from now on, I instruct you never to seal off your senses from ever again, said Cha Ming. Is that understood?

I hear and obey, master, the Luther said in a bitter tone. He hopped onto Cha Ming’s shoulder and began to purr loudly.

Cha Ming had expected Luther to rebel at some point, but not nearly so soon. Huxian had warned him that slave seals weren’t puppet seals. They could bind creatures to do certain things, but they still had their own will and could resist. He would need to work away at Luther’s resistance and put up some failsafes.

Speaking of checks, Cha Ming took out his mission jade. He confirmed that Dao God Thunderclash has perished in battle. A total point of 2,351,800 points had been transferred from Dao God Thunderclash to Daoist Clear Sky. All territories previously controlled by Dao God Thunderclash had now been annexed.

Unfortunately, the Dao God left no corpse or storage treasure. Cha Ming wished Huxian were here to recover these objects, but unfortunately, Huxian was busy with another matter.

“Many thanks for presiding over this conflict, Sect Masters,” Cha Ming said to Sect Master Sacred Earth, Patriarch Blighted Heaven, and Patriarch Blood God. “I believe the rebels have reconsidered their actions and will be joining us shortly.”

Most of Grand Artificer Liu’s faction was currently folding itself into Grand Artificer Fei’s fleet with lowered heads. Only a few irredeemable were making their exit, though Cha Ming saw a few members of the Puppet Lighting Sect following after them.

Cha Ming then turned his attention to the Blood God Sect. “Since the dispute has been resolved, I don’t believe Patriarch Blood God’s presence is required in the region.”

“Indeed,” said Sect Master Sacred Earth. “You’ve done what you came here to do. Now scram!”

Cha Ming felt a surge of murderous intent from Patriarch Blood God and Dao God Blood Seal. But they both controlled it and responded to Sacred Earth’s rudeness with a smile. “Well played, Sacred Earth,” Patriarch Blood God said. “Well played, Blighted Heaven. Well played, Daoist Clear Sky. Blood Seal? We’re leaving.”

He shot off into the sky and began issuing orders. Seconds later, the sea of blood was on the move, carrying with it its hundred or so ships and its host of blood demons and blood elementals. Instead of the slow, imperious space they’d arrived with, there was now some urgency to their movements.

“Grand Artificer Fei,” Sect Master Sacred Earth said. “It’s good that you’ve finally taken this important step and reached the middle of law stitching. Be sure to take the time to consolidate your gains and practice your sect’s soul and energy fusion technique. I expect it won’t be long before our region has another worthy powerhouse.”

“Many thanks for your guidance, Sect Master Sacred Earth,” Grand Artificer Fei said. “Alas, I can’t claim all credit, as it was Daoist Clear Sky’s resources that allowed me to make such a rapid breakthrough.”

“Indeed,” Sacred Earth said. “I’ve heard Daoist Clear Sky’s approach, and how it differs from Thunderclash’s. I look forward to interacting with our new warden.”

Cha Ming clasped his hands and gave them all a polite bow. “Many thanks, Sect Master. Your help was well timed and much appreciated. And do not worry – I believe it is my duty as a warden to assist the residents of the Chasewind Plane in fighting the encroach blight and the fiends that spew from it. I intend to stick to that purpose, and will provide aid to all parties involved, not just a single sect.”

Patriarch Blighted Heaven snorted lightly. “Seeing is believing.”

“Indeed, seeing is believing,” Cha Ming said. He held a hand above his eyes to block out the sun and peered off in the distance where the three blood sects had vanished. “What would Sect Master Sacred Earth’s view be on borrowing the Puppet Lighting Sect’s power for a bit of retaliation.”

“As long as they’re wiling and the losses to our region are not severe, I would not oppose this,” Sect Master Sacred Earth said.

“And how would you feel about joining in said retaliation?” Cha Ming asked.

“Don’t push your luck,” said Sect Master Sacred Earth.

“It doesn’t hurt to ask,” Cha Ming said. “If everything is settled here, so it’s best we take off right away.” He stored the three puppets left over from his fight with Dao God Thunderclash, then began organizing his next maneuver.