Chapter – 170 - Rhythm of Energy

Rihanna neither paused, nor did she lessen her attacks. It was as if she had not even heard what the man was shouting. Seeing her nonchalant response, both Uncle Yaoi and Artreya heaved a sigh of relief, turning back their attention to their attacks.

Zenoba looked askance at the girl who was solely focused on bombarding him with attacks with increasing aggressiveness. In this world, who would let go of such an opportunity?! Or had she realized that he was not really meaning to keep any of the words he was spouting?

He had met this girl before.....quite a few times in fact. How did she suddenly become so different?!

Rihanna pursed her lips. She had no intention of believing his words. Someone who did not care about all the disciples who had willingly followed him, someone who had not asked once what had happened to all of those disciples...why in the world would he want to take her in as his disciple?

Was that just a different, more honorable way of getting her to join his lair? Once inside, she would be at his mercy, and no one would know what happened to her.

Moreover....her cultivation method didn't allow her to accept all forms of techniques. And if she had to experiment and figure out techniques suiting her method of cultivation....why in the world would she become his disciple?! She already had Little Purple, and she could bet this fellow couldn't even match up to Little Purple's nails when it came to the knowledge of cultivation!

The berserk energy had burned out, leaving Zenoba panting heavily under the pressure of a drained body and mind. The continuous blood loss and attacks from all sides was turning his mind numb. Worse still, even though he had teleportation arrays with him, they refused to work within this barrier. this girl was truly talented....or just too lucky! How did she find such a barrier formation? It could confine all kinds of energy, making even other arrays unusable!

Even though his body and mind was drained, he couldn't stop the deep hatred and wrath clouding his judgement....he still wanted to try! He still wanted to break free...and then he would crush this girl till she begged for death!

As a Mental Ability User, Rihanna could sense Zenoba's mind slowly losing all rationality. This was the most dangerous state of a Mind User.....but also the best opportunity.

"Continue with your elemental attacks. Do not increase or decrease the intensity. Keep his body occupied, and drain off all his remaining energy."

"What are you planning?"

Uncle Yaoi couldn't help feeling pressured. Unlike Artreya, he didn't have a good grasp of Rihanna's capabilities. Moreover, even if the man was down, he was still much stronger than Rihanna. He was scared that even while going down, the man might try to give her a killer blow.

Rihanna sensed his gaze, and turned to face it with a strong determination shining in her eyes.

"It is time to end this. If I don't end it now, it will only continue to keep coming back after me. Plus he knows too many secrets about me, so I can't let him go."

Rihanna paused, taking in the shock in Uncle Yaoi's eyes.

"Don't worry. I don't plan on killing him."

Uncle Yaoi blinked in surprise. He himself hadn't realized that his expression was so open that even a little girl could read it! Well...killing wasn't out of norm....but he truly didn't want to see this little girl caught in the web of darkness which often trapped cultivators.

Hearing her words, he sighed inwardly. He wasn't trying to live in misconceptions. She might very well have killed before. But that she decided to consider his feelings right now was enough for him.

As Uncle Yaoi and Artreya kept up with the intense barrage of attacks, Rihanna closed her eyes, slowly losing herself into the trance like state of deep focus. All sounds, sensations around her ceased, and she could only sense the man inside the glowing barrier. His mind was in a chaos, the gray energy running rampant all over his body, swirling like whirlpools within his brain.

That was the difference between Mental Ability and other elemental users. While elemental attacks used the spirit root to gather energy, and then transferred it outwards through the fingers or the guiding weapons, mind users had to use their mind to absorb and control the grey energy.

Locking onto the core of Zenoba's Mental Energy, Rihanna started releasing thick streams of her own mental powers into the barrier. Passing through this barrier, the already thick stream became thicker by at least 3-4 times, forming a vortex of pressure all around Zenoba, trying to crush his mind energy to pulp.

But Zenoba had a higher level of mental ability, and though his energy was thinner, it was far more darker and denser. Being challenged, the enraged grey energy started hitting back at the lighter grey energy.

Very soon the inside of the energy sphere became hazy, and Uncle Yaoi and Artreya could barely make out what was happening inside.

Only Rihanna could see through her own perceptions.

A dense thick formless dark grey energy was condensing in one corner of the sphere. It gleamed with a faint blood-red shine around the edges, looking like an ominous cloud. Even though it was much smaller than her own condensed energy form, it looked way more threatening. A huge light grey formless cloud of energy was trying to fight against the dark and dense formless cloud.

Even though Zenoba was drained off energy, the sudden appearance of this light grey energy seemed to ignite his berserk state. The dark gray energy attacked Rihanna with full aggression. Within a short span of fighting with this dark grey energy, Rihanna was already feeling the constrain and heavy pressure, and the edges of her energy cloud was being constantly broken down. Despite having more energy at her disposal, the pressure of the denser energy was binding her from all directions. A dull heaviness was growing within her mind as she felt her energy slowly seeping out endlessly, and her mind was going out of her control.

'.....Absorb....'

In the mind numbing blankness of her mental space, the word resounded softly.....like a memory of a distant past. That....wasn't Little Purple's voice! It sounded like her own voice...but also different!

...Absorb?....Hmmm.....she did have the power of absorbing all energies around herself and making them move according to the control of her own powers...but could she do that with mental powers as well?

As she thought of this, Rihanna felt herself floating in a vast space of nothingness. No air, no wind, no heat nor cold....she couldn't feel anything.

Feeling confused, she opened her eyes. Immediately before her eyes, she saw the entire inside of the sphere.....the dark grey energy pitted against the slowly crumbling light grey energy, the slowly fading barrier inside which the energy was being contained, and even the hazy figures of the two men outside the sphere.

What was this strange space? She could see everything, yet she was strangely detached from everything around herself! Almost like she was viewing everything through the eyes of another person!

For a while she just watched the two energies trying to tear down each other. Of course the lighter energy was slowly succumbing to the denser cloud. But Rihanna felt no sense of threat or anxiety. She was like a passer-by....just watching the entire scenario.

Suddenly feeling something, Rihanna raised her fingers, giving a twirl in the air.

A stream of light-grey energy twirled around the edges of the denser energy. And some of the denser energy was absorbed by the lighter energy!

Her eyes opened wide, but instead of shock or surprise, curiosity and interest was dancing in her eyes. She twirled her fingers again, and another stream of energy danced around another part, absorbing some more of the denser energy.

A tiny smile appeared on this invisible form of Rihanna, as her eyes glinted in excitement. She raised both her hands, her fingers pausing in the air, as if poised to dance on the keyboard of a piano. And then they started moving.

They danced, they twirled, they tapped on the invisible air before flicking the air around. And as if tied to these fingers with some special, invisible threads, the light grey energy broke down into innumerable waves of energy, dancing, twirling, flickering all around the dense grey energy.

They were so many, so fast, and moved in every direction, giving the dense energy no time to sense their movements. The more they moved, the faster they grew, dancing to a rhythm of its own, moving up and down and all around at the speed of thoughts.

And every place it touched, the dense energy lost a little bit more of its power.

The dense cloud which was still agitated, slowly started realizing that it was fast losing all its power. And the more power it lost, the stronger the lighter-grey energy mass seemed to become! Facing the threat of utter destruction, the dense energy cloud finally responded in fear.

It ran from its place, trying to escape the clutches of the light grey energy.

But how was that possible. The light grey energy had long dispersed itself into a multitude of thin streams, and now they circled around the dense cloud in all directions, at a dizzying speed.

Uncle Yaoi and Artreya paused in their attacks, staring in awe at the amazing scene slowly unfolding within the array. Zillions of thin energy streams were tearing through the dense energy cloud, slowly devouring it. As the dense cloud shrunk, becoming tinier and tinier, the number of energy streams around it became denser and denser, and they sped up till even the two of them could hardly keep up with their momentum.

As the dense energy was completely absorbed, Zenoba's body slowly fell down on the ground. The spasming limbs told the two that he was still alive. However, what would remain of his mind....was a whole different matter.

They glanced up again. Even after devouring the entire dense grey energy, the movement of the streams of light grey energy had not stopped. If anything, they seemed to have to gained even more momentum. Glancing towards Rihanna, both of them grew worried. If she was able to control this out of control energy, her mental ability would probably grow to a whole new level.

But if she failed...both of them paused their thoughts. They didn't want their thoughts to go off in that direction.