Chapter 31: The House Still Stood

Chapter 31: The House Still Stood

Just as the three cultivators charged at Paike in anger, Guan Li made his move. He managed to snag one of the wingmen, catching him in some sort of hold before throwing him to the ground. That still left two higher realm cultivators charging at Paike.

The Topaz cultivator was moving so quickly that Paike had trouble reacting in time. Still, he managed to turn ever so slightly, just enough to avoid the first strike. The wind from the Topaz cultivator’s fist rippled his hair as it went past. The other cultivator took a second to draw his own bo staff, and the wind whistled as it swung for Paike.

Paike, though, had been ready for this. He had prepared his technique while they were talking, so he just had to push out for a brief moment with his hand, and his qi solidified into a tiny disc. The staff slammed against it. The disc cracked but didn’t break.

The smaller disc wouldn’t last very long. Still, he could produce a handwidth sized disc in almost as much time as it would take an ordinary cultivator to produce a larger one. It was strictly worse than how the technique was intended to be used, as it required him to anticipate a much smaller area to block. It also didn’t take advantage of his unique properties that let him set up a larger and longer-lasting shield. But it would do for now.

Paike watched his footwork as he moved into the blind spot of the Topaz cultivator as he moved past. Paike carefully shuffled in a practiced set of steps that made it extremely difficult for him to hit cleanly. Of course, being hit by even a glancing blow from a Topaz cultivator while he was still in Middle Ruby, was quite painful.

A clipping shot to his ribs, which just grazed him, almost knocked the wind out of him, leaving him feeling slightly nauseous. Still, his training took over, and he moved with the blow, letting it spin him around. He snaked out a foot, catching the cultivator in the knee with a vicious kick.

I really need a weapon, Paike thought to himself as he ducked below a follow-up strike from the bo staff. It was one of the first lessons of his family, to never be unarmed. While a cultivator should always be able to fight with their qi alone it was silly to forgo a force multiplier like a weapon by choice. A lesson he had neglected to listen to.

Now, this was going to be bad. A strike into his lower back sent him stumbling forward, surprising both him and the bo staff-wielding cultivator. Paike used the unexpected fall to plant his shoulder in the young man’s stomach, sending them both sprawling to the ground. He rolled with the momentum, avoiding another blow as a second bo staff struck the ground next to him.

Paike thought, frantically wracking his brain for some way to turn the tables. Could he use his new art or maybe tap into his physical cultivation combat trance? But even as he considered it, he knew it wouldn’t work. There were no elders here to heal an opponent, and if he won, well, that’d be bad. If he lost, it would still be bad.

Were he and Guan Li going to have to leave the house? It pained him, but as much as he wanted to, he couldn’t envision a world where he managed to save it. Clearly, if a Topaz cultivator wanted the house to burn, it was going to burn.

They might have been able to stall for a while, but Paike resigned himself to losing the house. He didn’t have many belongings stored there. The small bit of resources and allowance he had was kept on his person. Though the cultivation chamber and the amenities would be sorely missed. Maybe they could take someone else’s.

Completing his roll, Paike sprung to his feet, briefly catching a glimpse of Guan Li barely holding on against the Late Ruby cultivator as the two of them scrapped. Guan Li wasn’t fighting fairly, constantly tripping and throwing the cultivator and bringing the fight into a brawl where he was quick enough to move around. He’d also managed to snag the cultivator’s bo staff and was inexpertly whacking at him with it whenever he had the chance, using it in such a way that extended his ability to keep the cultivator off his feet.

Clearly, Guan Li thought the best he could do was stall his opponent, which might have been a good tactic if Paike could actually win his fight. Paike couldn’t help but feel flattered, he didn’t have time to process it before he had to dodge again. As he missed a block and was struck in the side with the thin piece of wood, he felt a welt forming underneath his robe almost instantly. He knew he wasn’t going to win. So far, he had managed a few weak kicks to the leg, but nothing debilitating, nothing even noticeable. The fight had only been going on for a handful of seconds, and it was already clear that he wasn’t even going to be able to run. The difference between realms was just too significant.

If it had just been the Late Ruby cultivator, he probably could have won. If it had been two Late Ruby cultivators, he probably could have held his own. It was a little bit arrogant, but honestly, these weren’t outstanding fighters. They were about as good as any noble kid who had learned how to fight but only had a few years of serious training before they managed to go off to the local sect. Paike, though—well, among the mortals, he would have been a talent already before he even awakened. Not that that was too much to brag about, but it certainly gave him a leg up in these early stages.

He ducked under a whistling blow from the bo staff and received a strike in the legs from the other side, courtesy of the other cultivator. He skipped back several steps, putting distance between them. What could he do? What could he say?

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“So, who are you?” Paike called out as he backpedaled. “I feel like there must be a reason you want to lower yourself to strike down to a lower realm.”

His words fell on deaf ears. The Topaz cultivator bellowed in rage and charged forward. Fighting had made him even more riled up than the words. Now, there was no chance to communicate. An unfocused gout of flame forced him to dive to the side.

Paike cursed himself for his rash thinking earlier. He had gotten overconfident and was going to pay the price. Maybe if he knew who they were, he’d have some sort of chance, some sort of weakness he could exploit. But he had definitely played this wrong. He had overestimated how much he needed to antagonize them to get them to give up their advantage. With his recklessness, he had pushed past and overshot the mark considerably. He needed to have gathered more information first.

A large, crashing sound of a building collapsing only a dozen meters behind him brought the fight to a screeching halt. A small female body flew through the rubble as the house became a pile of debris, and she smashed into a row of houses on the other street.

A taller woman strode over the ruins, walking on green leaves as she stepped down to the street. The smaller cultivator stepped out of the broken facade of the house across the street and pointed a spray of brilliantly purple liquid, blasting the taller woman and forcing her to jump off the leaves a little sooner than she wanted to.

With a terrible scream, the woman wiped the liquid from her face. Even as the purple liquid vanished, the red welt across her face remained. The new arrivals started to trade barbed words as they gathered their next techniques. The fight around him stilled, and Paike rolled to his feet.

Paike and Guan Li met eyes before dashing off into the alleyway. The Topaz cultivator and the two Late Ruby ones were running in the other direction. This was not a fight any of them could deal with. Not having only awakened a week ago. Maybe by the end of the year if they were diligent. But two Peak Topaz cultivators with at least half a dozen arts each, combat experience, and lethal techniques at their disposal, who casually destroyed houses as they fought? That was not anything Paike wanted to tangle with.

Still, they’d come just in time. Otherwise, he was afraid he was going to get a real beating. Maybe the fight would leave their house untouched.