Vs Yuze (2)

Yuze looked at Lingyun. He was standing in the same stance as when the fight had begun except with the large spear butt first into the ground and the sword in his left hand. There was a solid feel emanating from him. A subtle breeze blew over the platform in the few steps separating them.

'What was happening?' he had no doubt that Lingyun had used some sort of technique to throw him off balance and the only reason he was still in the fight was because he had a higher cultivation realm. Lingyun while still feeling solid seemed a little exhausted. His experience after facing many opponents told him that he should end the fight quickly.

"It seems that your attacks are the true Phantom Strikes?" He said lowering his saber.

"Phantom Strikes? I guess you could call them that." Lingyun smiled and hefted that long spear over his shoulder.

Yuze sheathed his saber once and drew it once more. With this single motion his aura exploded. His earlier attacks had been to test out this young prodigy of the clan but he had been in for a bigger surprise than he had expected. He still had yet to figure out how those attacks worked but that would be saved for later.

Lingyun went on guard immediately pushing his soul energy to the limit. Others might have felt pressure under Yuze's aura but Lingyun was not one of the others. Strong winds begun to buffet the inside of the arena and they continued to increase the higher Yuze's aura rose. Lingyun knew from the get got that once Yuze got serious his chances of winning would dip significantly but wind was something he was well equipped to handle. He put away his spear. He was not going to attack anymore. This would be excellent practice for something else.

The first slash came and he had to push his own aura to the limit to increase his strength as much as possible. Yuze noticed this. This was the first time he had shown a hint of his aura in the entire time he had fought. He was quite surprised. While the quantity was not much the purity of the Qi he could detect was flawless. Exactly how had he cultivated these past three months.

Lingyun was unable to dodge of deflect and was forced to block it. This pushed him back eleven steps. He had barely enough time to breathe before the next attacks came. This time there were two steps and while he managed to deflect the first he was pushed back further by the next one. The next set of attacks increased to four and Lingyun managed to deal with three and was again pushed back by the the fourth.

The next attack had to be eight and he prepared himself for them. When they came the wind that beat agains him increased in intensity as did the sharpness. And yet this time he danced with the attack. He dodged the first then somehow weaved himself between the second third and fourth that were so close together. The fifth attack he deflected as did the sixth. He blocked the seventh and something incredible happened with the eighth.

After blocking the seventh Lingyun held the sword before him. His perception was sharp as he felt the movement of the air around him. He increased his focus and could somehow detect that the air itself was made of very small particles of which Yuzes Qi was mixed in as some sort of anchor. The Qi was was not spread out evenly within the blades of air as there were some parts that held weaker concentration of Qi.

He let his Yin-Yang Pure Qi flow into his sword and just like he had done when he was neutralizing the Yang Qi as he cultivated he slowly weakened the incoming Wind Qi. As his sword came into contact with it was somehow weakened by the purer Qi which allowed him to take control of the wind blade. His movement was unnatural even to him as it was something he had never tried before. For an instance the windblade surrounded him like a tornado and then he returned it to Yuze still carrying the same force if not more because of the pure nature of his Qi.

Immediately after returning the attack to Yuze he noticed something unsettling however. He looked at his sword and it was bent in an odd way. It had been twisted. He could understand it. The wind blade had felt heavy in his hands and it had taken quite the effort to return it to Yuze. He would need to vastly increase his strength to jump cultivation realms and do this repeatedly.

Yuze had been surprised by his attack suddenly coming back to him when he was about to unleash the next sequence of attacks and had to stop and deal with it. What shocked him was the weight of the Wind blade. It had somehow gotten stronger. He looked over at Lingyun who was standing near the edge of the platform looking at his sword. After the blade had dissipated he stood ready to start again then he stopped and sheathed his sword.Lingyun had withdrawn his aura and put away his weapon.

"As expected of our Senior brother, It was an enlightening fight," he was panting slightly as he clasped his hands.

"Ha haha. You gave me quite a few surprises yourself." Yuze said. There was was a fire in his eyes, "Lets do this again sometime."

"Yes." Lingyun said.

"What did you think of this fight?" This was the first time the Matriarch had asked about a particular fight during the entire tournament. She had not asked anyone in particular but all the elders.

"I don't understand how Yuze, who is first in all rankings was pushed by Lingyun who has barely cultivated." a junior elder said as he looked up at the Matriach. She and the senior elders were sitting at the highest point with decreasing seniority the lower they sat.

"I thought it might be so..." she said looking at the contestants who were descending from the platform. "There is a cultivation technique assigned to only elders for now. It is called the Soul Cultivation Mantra."

"I saw this technique but I didn't understand it ..." another junior elder said looking up at the Matriarch.

"I am assigning you all a task," she begun. Her words could only be heard by the elders even though she spoke as naturally as anyone might. "You are all to achieve at least a minor breakthrough in that cultivation technique. Then you must guide the clan members in this cultivation technique."

Since she had cultivated this herself she knew how difficult it could be and asking this of them was not kind but this had opened up a whole new avenue of strength for the clan after witnessing the fight just now. Lingyun was surely talented to be able to use feints like those. She smiled a knowing smile before saying, "If you have trouble with this, come to me and I will teach offer insights since I have used the technique myself. Only then will you understand how the fight turned out like so."

She looked downwards at Linghua and Lingshi who were walking up to the platform for the next match and smiled, 'I wonder what those two have in store for us next."