Chapter 57: Tough Foes
-----
Bing Xue’s doppelganger, directly connected to her mind, analyzed the “monsters” in front of her. They definitely looked very human-like, but they also had a primate appearance mixed in. All while being covered by large quantities of fur in most of their body. Their height was tremendous; each one was at least three and a half meters tall.
They carried no weapons and no clothes either; they simply relied on their titanic, ridiculous strength to fight and win against anybody. Bing Xue had just seen how one of them instantly killed a C-Rank Hunter in a split second with a mere wave of their fists.
And not only that, as they had come from those strange, gray-colored gates, where she sensed a large quantity of Time Essence coming from. She had already attempted to close the Gates like she had before but failed to do so.
Yes, she failed.
Her doppelganger sighed, “Maybe if I had my full power, but my doppelgangers only possess fifty percent of it all. That also includes comprehension of the Daos.”
And above all, she felt a stronger presence than her in terms of Space Manipulation. Although Bing Xue possessed unparalleled power, techniques, and power, it was not the same when it came to the comprehension of many elements, as she specialized in Light, which came with both its strengths and its weaknesses. And the Gods possessed myriad divinities of all kinds; the higher the floors, the stronger such divinities were.
It was already within her calculations that eventually she would face those who surpassed her in certain aspects. One of them was Space Manipulation. Her Time Manipulation was almost flawless, but her Space Manipulation was at best, halfway through mastery.
She knew Gods relied on the amazing power of Divinity Trees, and such Trees, if grown enough, could easily surpass her comprehension of the Daos she had yet to Master.
But for now…
“Ungaaaah!”
The giant caveman jumped towards her, swinging its gigantic arms.
Bing Xue’s sharp eyes noticed something.
The caveman’s giant arms were imbued with a certain energy.
Was it Mana?
Or was it Ki?
No, none of them, yet both.
“How interesting.”
BAAAM!
The caveman’s powerful harms slammed against Bing Xue’s doppelganger body, generating cracks through her nine-colored barrier. For a moment, she felt surprised. Each punch from the caveman continued to create more cracks.
“Impressive! Despite how primitive you look, you all possess incredible powers.” Bing Xue laughed. “It seems this universe—no, this multiverse—still has many challenges to offer me!”
With a mere swing of her hands, several threads of golden metallic Photon Energy were released, further strengthened by her Divinity, and wrapped around the giant caveman.
The strange, clear brown energy flowing through his entire body quickly attempted to help the caveman free himself, as he was now being restrained by these threads.
And it was slowly managing to do so, as some threads began to snap.
"Incredible to think a caveman from all things would be able to resist my power to an extent." She laughed. “Well, enough with playing around.”
Ten swords of light appeared above her, made of her upgraded Photonic Energy, and impaled the caveman until he was torn to shreds. His body offered great resistance, and Bing Xue felt like she was fighting a Martial Beast that specialized in the Dao of Shells and Defense.
Yet in the end, even a turtle shell can break if it’s thrown from the skies. With a powerful kick, she threw the dying caveman into the ground, his body impacting the other one, and with the centrifugal force, both of their bodies exploded, leaving behind a pile of minced flesh, broken bones, innards, and blood.
SPLAAAT!
“Hmph, I’ll have to investigate these strange beings later. But for now, I must secure the survival of the Hunters.” Bing Xue thought. “Let’s divide and conquer, shall we?”
Her body began to divide itself at the same time as she healed the Hunters that had been massacred by the cavemen seconds ago, even reviving the half-eaten one in the process.
The Hunters, still astonished, could only glance in utter awe.
“A-Amazing, she’s so strong…”
“So that’s Bing Xue!”
“She came to save us!”
“I-I’m alive?!”
Bing Xue gave them a deadly glare.
“What are you standing there for?! Go back to the city!”
She whisked them away within a split second, their bodies encapsulating into a bubble made of Space, and then teleported back inside the city.
At the same time as she did that, her body had finished dividing. Due to the distance from her true body, she could only divide herself into four more copies that still possessed 50% of her strength.
Any more than that, and they would begin decreasing their power. If they were too weak, she feared the powerful and strange “primal” beings of those gates could manage to defeat her doppelgangers somehow.
And she couldn’t let that happen when the lives of the hunters were in danger. Despite how arrogant she might sometimes act, she cared for their lives, as they were the guardians of this city, the city where her family lived.
Just like an Elder would protect the young disciples from an enemy sect attack, Bing Xue also thought it was her responsibility to protect the younger generations.
FLASH!
Within a split second, all five of her doppelgangers teleported away in different directions.
Her priorities were straight.
Save the hunters, destroy the monsters, and then look for a way to close the Gates.
As the Guardian of Earth, she will not let any God or Interdimensional Cavemen get away with ever harming her home planet again.
[The Tower God {Grandfather of Time} says that this is only the beginning. The earth shall pay for your sins.]
“So it was you…” her eyes flashed with red light, and a slightly wicked smile appeared on her flawless face. “You love courting death, don’t you?”
…
“ROOOAARR!”
The mighty roar of a titanic Tyrannosaurus Rex echoed across the surrounding forests of the city. Two groups of Hunters that had been recently hunting low-ranked monsters to level up before entering the Tower were now running for their lives.
Maybe if the size of this dinosaur was actually scientifically accurate, it might not have been that much of a problem for two parties of Hunters with magic and skills to help them. However, this thing wasn’t just seven or eight meters tall.
No, it was over thirty meters tall, so big that it loomed over the hunters from above like a titan about to snatch them all away. The only thing they could do was run as the monstrous dinosaur’s gigantic claws grew closer to them.
But that wasn’t everything; right in front of their escape route, four large, muscular figures appeared. The cavemen had circled them and appeared there, stopping their advance.
“Ograaah!”
The roar of one of the cavemen the hunters had not noticed, who was sitting over the Tyrannosaurus, reverberated behind them. The other cavemen raised their giant arms, pointing their big hands towards the hunters.
“W-What the fuck is going on?!”
“Was that caveman riding the giant dinosaur?!”
“How in the hell can you tame such a huge thing?!”
“They’re coming; watch out!”
The tank of the party put himself in front of everyone, placing his shield in front of the cavemen’s fists, only for his shield to immediately break into pieces once it contacted the fist.
CLASH!
Not only that, but the fist pierced the young man’s chest, blood splattering into the ground, as the group of hunters saw in horror how the caveman pulled the man’s beating heart and ate it.
“A-Ah…”
The tank fell to the ground, his body going limp as he died without believing what he had seen.
“Unga!”
The caveman that ate the heart felt a sudden burst of power. The strange energies that fueled the strength and superhuman power of the cavemen and the dinosaurs were complimented by the Mana of this world.
Humans, in particular, had high quantities of greatly refined Mana within their bodies, and it was much better to eat their flesh than to hunt the other monsters, as they had already run away.
“C-Chris…”
The swordsman of the party fell to her knees, looking at the scene in utter disbelief. Fear took over her body, and she couldn’t move anymore. The other party members were all being massacred and torn apart around her.
As her tears flowed from her eyes, she saw the giant caveman who killed her boyfriend appear in front of her, his giant, bloody hands reaching her head.
A wicked smile adorned his face, like the smile apes would make to intimidate others.
Yet.
FLASH!
A beam of black and gray suddenly surged from the skies, piercing the caveman’s chest and leaving a huge, bloody hole.
“G-Guugh…?!”
The caveman vomited blood, no longer with a heart; despite being so tough, his entire body collapsed into the ground with a loud thud.
The girl slowly looked into the skies, finding a beautiful blonde Russian girl with sharp gray eyes and an aura exuding dark purple energies.
“T-That’s…!”
Her eyes were filled with hope as she realized who it was.
A World-Class Player.
“Yanisse?!”
The Russian beauty disappeared from the skies, shifting through space and then appearing again above the other cavemen. With a swing of her hands, three beams of pure and concentrated void pierced the bodies of the cavemen.
They could offer no resistance at all; despite being so powerful and tough, their bodies, covered in bloody holes, dropped dead. Yanisse was the sole wielder of the Element of Void in the world; her mastery over such an element had gone beyond the System itself already.
Not only has she learned to use her Skills without activating them using her System Status, but she could also transform, shape, and create new “spells” out of her own Skills abilities.
Just like now.
“ROOOAARR!”
The Tyrannosaurus roared back at her, rushing towards her with its gigantic body. Its enormous jaws, which could munch at a whole skyscraper, reached her.
“Begone.”
However, with a simple word she uttered from her beautiful lips, a wave of void emerged out of her body, reaching the dinosaur and pushing it away a dozen meters.
BAAAM!
“Not dead yet?”
Her eyebrows raised lightly as she noticed the dinosaur slowly start to stand back up. The area where her shockwave hit was burned and damaged with a very ugly wound, but the dinosaur’s incredibly tough scales and muscles helped it survive against the pressure of the void itself.
“I’m getting softer, or are these things way too strong?”
“GROAAR!”
The dinosaur ran towards her again, and as Yanisse's hands summoned a dozen spheres of dark purple light, Void Essence coursed through her entire body and then shaped into these tiny spheres.
Using them like bullets wasn’t hard, as she ordered them to fly at lightning speed, landing on the dinosaur’s skull and piercing it.
The monster’s head was pierced as blood splattered everywhere, yet its skull was incredibly tough; its jaws opened as Yanisse waved her hands, teleporting the survivors to her side as she evaded.
CRASH!
The monster’s jaws hit the floor, breaking down any ruins from what remained of the city within these areas of the wasteland.
“Those cavemen died quickly, but this thing will take longer than I imagined!”
Yanisse moved rapidly from place to place, evading the dinosaur’s jaws as they hit the ground, attempting to predate on her.
“Then how about this?”
She gathered her Void Essence into her hands and then shaped it into a long and sharp shape. Resembling a spear—no, an arrow.
FLASH!
The arrow flew through the skies, reaching the dinosaur, who foolishly opened its jaws, trying to devour the incoming missile. The arrow pierced its throat and then passed through it as an explosion engulfed the monster’s entire head.
BOOOM!
The gigantic dinosaur finally fell after Yanisse had to attack it like four times. She sighed in relief as she saw the enormous body fall. She opened her inventory as she started drinking a Mana Elixir.
Her Void Magic was incredibly strong, but it always drained her Mana very quickly. She had to replenish herself and move on; the survivors needed to reach a safe place after all.
“UNGAAH!”
What she didn’t expect was for the rider of the dinosaur to sneak behind her, swinging his massive arms towards her.
CLASH!
-----