Soul-pressure

Hearing Kuro's shout within her consciousness, she reflexively turned around only to come face to face with a purple Elemental Fiend. The Elemental Fiend's sharp mandibles were only a foot away from Hana's exposed neck. Its meaning was clear, it was going to decapitate Hana's neck!

Hana suddenly felt something shattering within her consciousness. A sharp pain manifested in between her brow as her ruby red eyes glowed intensely. The pain was like a sharp knife continuously stabbing at her glabella multiple times in slow motion. It was extremely agonizing. Although only a fraction of a second had gone by, she felt the pain deep into her soul.

Before the ferocious-looking mandibles could snap, Hana took a step back. She could feel something was threatening to come out from her eyes. The pain was traveling from her glabella to her eyes before it burst out. Her closed eyes were forcefully opened, and a force so strong was released to the whole cave network with Hana at the center. It covered the entire labyrinthine nest and even leaked to the surface, startling both the spiritual bird and the group of Elemental Fiends who were fighting for their lives.

A heavy pressure laced with the Lord-level Lightning Serpent aura immediately descended, inundating the attacking purple Elemental Fiend in front of her. It was smashed downwards savagely in a split of a second. The Elemental Fiend struggled hard in a confused manner but couldn't move its limbs at all. It felt like it was being pressed under an unmovable mountain. Under the eyes of every beast present around Hana, she took out the clawknife from her back and severed the Elemental Fiend's head with a pained expression, ending its life.

Once the Elemental Fiend's head was detached from its body, its warm bodily liquid spurted out and drenching Hana's face. Hana was so stunned, the pressure pressing on everyone was suddenly lifted. Her face lost all colors as she tried her hardest from throwing up as her hands holding the clawknife shivered.

[Oh no... What am I doing…]

Although she had done the unthinkable reflexively out of self preservation, once her mind worked properly, she felt faint. It was her first time killing another life form in such a heartless way. She didn't know where did this level of courage came from.

At that exact moment, the Elemental Fiend King leapt to the air and released a pair of translucent wings! Its body was flaming with fire.

[Tripled element spirit beast!] Shiro was shocked and appalled at the same time. He had been too negligent. From their information gathering, the stronger ones would be the purple-colored General-classed Elemental Fiends with dual-element abilities. They had thought that the King would be slightly stronger in prowess when compared to the General-class ones. They had underestimated the Elemental Fiends!

The ice encasing the lower half of the Elemental Fiend King's body has been melted stealthily when all of their attention had been focusing on Hana. The Elemental Fiend King was going to attack Hana as it had identified the leader of these intruders.

The lost connection was but for a split second due to Hana's internal turmoil, which directly affected her soul. Once she got a grip of herself, her ruby red eyes flickered to life again. She turned her ruby red eyes towards the incoming Elemental Fiend King while holding her temples with her left hand. She was trying to suppress the agonizing pain she currently felt. Green protruding veins started to appear on her temples as she exerted herself again, blasting out another wave of pressure towards the Elemental Fiend King.

The Elemental Fiend King was wrenched from the air and forcefully pulled down. As it fell down wretchedly, Shiro arrived and stomped on it furiously. Next, he pulled its wings off using his jaws.

[Now, let me teach you a lesson you will never forget!!!] Shiro fumed with vengeance.

He trashed the pitiful Elemental Fiend King as how a wolf trashing a rabbit. The little snakehead shivered with apprehension at what he saw and silently vowed not to cross the seemingly-regal-but-oh-so-ruthless spirit beast in the future.

...

Similar to the snakehead fish, The Primordial Queen Mother shivered in fear as she observed her king being tormented tragically by the white creature through their telepathic channel. The beatings were so savage until the Elemental Fiend King stayed limped on the cave floor like a dead log. Shiro had made sure he trashed the Elemental Fiend King with a vengeance. He was in a rare state of rage, most of it with himself, for failing to protect their mom.

Until he felt a warmth sensation on his head, bringing clarity to his soul.

"Enough Sweetie. I am alright now. Remember our objective here." Hana rubbed Shiro's head and back to calm him down. He was currently very agitated.

Shiro's breathing was very rapid at the moment, as icy breath filled the space around him from his lack of control. He stopped trashing the insolent little insect unwillingly.

"Are you alright? Take a few deep breaths and calm down. I'm alright. See? Nothing happens here." Hana pulled her fluffy pet towards her and gave him a warm hug with her drenched body. She had asked Chomper to wash her with clean water to rid herself of the dead purple Elemental Fiend's body fluid. She knew Shiro was blaming himself for the attack.

The Primordial Queen Mother saw the white creature stood up on two hind legs within her senses. To her horror, it used its right paw to grab on the Elemental Fiend King's mandibles and dragged it with them in tow. They walked languidly towards her location. She droned in apprehension beside the Elemental Poison pool.

She couldn't stay here anymore! She needed to get help from her warriors!

At that moment, the waters within the pool agitated; the final General-classed Elemental Fiend crawled out from within the pool. Its previous deep red color had turned to purple, indicating the presence of dual-element within. The Primordial Queen Mother droned in relief and slowly crawled into her own nesting chamber beside the elemental pools. At least she had this one to delay the intruders while she tried to escape by making a tunnel from the other side of her nesting chamber. The final purple-colored Elemental Fiend stood guard after it closed the opening with a large boulder in an attempt to protect its Queen.

...

[What happened just now, Kuro? Thank you for helping out.] Hana conversed with the faraway Kuro telepathically. She was still unsure how she had protected herself just now. Her doted little snake must have done something to help her again because Hana could feel the little snake's aura. Since they had cultivated the Lightning Emperor Divinity Soul diligently together, she had familiarized herself with Kuro's unique presence and could feel him anywhere as long as he was near.

The telepathic channel was silent for a moment before Kuro's voice reverberated in her mind. [It wasn't me, Mommy.] He said quietly.

Hana was shocked by Kuro's comment. [I definitely felt your aura coming out from me, Ku-chan! How come?!]

[What Mommy blasted out was soul power in the form of Soul-pressure. It was the most basic use of soul power to suppress weaker enemies. However, somehow, instead of using your own power, you managed to 'borrow' my soul power through our soul connection. Please don't do it too frequently Mommy! It will burden your soul and body. Your constitution was not strong enough at the moment.] Kuro worriedly explained. Hana could detect a strong level of anxiety and helplessness emitted from the little black snake's end. He was currently in an emotional turmoil too.

Hana and Shiro paused their steps as they looked at each other. Shiro was present within the telepathic conversation, as Hana had brought the conversation into the public channel from earlier on so that they could always share information comprehensively. She didn't want to make Shiro feel left out.

[Mommy, can you consciously try to exert Brother's aura again now?] Try it. Shiro quietly spoke with a tinge of wonderment in his gaze.

Hana closed her eyes and concentrate but nothing happened for the first few seconds. She suddenly remembered to chant the soul cultivation chant under her breath and within her mind, since that was what she did at the exact moment the strange energy manifested. She slowly opened her glowing ruby red eyes as the Soul-pressure manifested. However, after around 30 seconds, blood started to flow from her nose.

[Mommy! Stop it now!] Kuro was so flustered, he nearly fell down from the tree canopy.

[Wow, surprisingly, it's a success, but I could only hold it for a few seconds.] Hana wiped the blood with shaky hands while chuckling weakly. For once, her confidence grew. She could finally do something for the team too and not just being a burden. She then suddenly turned around and dipped her bloodied hands inside Chomper's water bubble to wash her hands. Both Shiro and Chomper were speechless with the aunty's behavior.

"Ah, done!" Hana admired her clean hands. "Let's get going. The Queen is waiting for us." Hana laughed lightly. The new skill will help her tremendously. She was feeling lucky and lighthearted until the pain felt from the mental burden could be ignored.

...

Kuro was silent all the way.

Because he had just started to practice the new soul cultivation chant with Mommy, he wasn't very clear of the exact effect of the cultivation method. Nonetheless, he had submerged within Mommy's Soul Hall Domain temporarily to see a new unstable link being forged between Mommy's soul with his soul when Mommy started to chant by herself! The new connection was made of runes from the archaic chant he taught to Mommy. As the link was chained to his soul within the Soul Hall domain, he could faintly feel his soul power was being siphoned in a barely traceable amount through the link to enter Mommy's soul. Once she stopped, the temporary link disintegrated as the runes scattered.

This is an early indication of entering the second realm of the Lightning Emperor Divinity Soul. The skill, known as Soul-empowerment, can only be used after the breakthrough, and the soul link meets particular criteria! This was big! She had forcefully achieved a premature breakthrough!

By right, their mommy needed to achieve complete mastery in Soul-link before she could attempt to break a significant bottleneck before entering the next realm. The Soul-link itself had four levels of mastery; initial mastery, small achievement mastery, major achievement mastery and finally, complete mastery. He was unequivocal with Mommy's achievement; she was just at initial mastery at the moment. After all, she had only earnestly cultivated not more than ten days!

[How did Mommy do it?!] Kuro pondered with worry.

Kuro ruminated over the details of the Lightning Emperor Divinity Soul within his bloodline memory but couldn't pinpoint anything noteworthy; the words used were too archaic and ancient. He needed to know if there's any hidden danger which could affect Mommy's well being since she was an aberration to this soul cultivation technique. His eyes were clouded with apprehension and uncertainty, but he forcefully held it in.

Should he find a way to contact the clan he had forsaken ages ago?

No! He couldn't!

Mommy could be killed if they knew!

There was no one to ask but for him to depend on himself. After deliberating for a long time, Kuro decided to observe first. Once he found something untoward which could endanger Mommy, he would immediately intervene.

Kuro suddenly felt that he really needed to be more diligent than Mommy in cultivating. Since Mommy's progress was so fast, he was worried he couldn't catch up. He needed to go through all the tribulations of the cultivation technique first before letting Mommy attempt it so that he could check for any anomaly within the cultivation technique.

...