"Kill!"
Upon Hong Chunhua's inciting order, Venerable Bloodtorrent sped through the large-sized Void Portal with her blood-red bullwhip in hand; she gripped it so tightly that her hand trembled a little. Since she started the difficult path of cultivation, long before she took upon the Daoist title of Bloodtorrent, becoming a fiercely regarded rogue cultivator amongst the stars, when she was simply Wu Jinyan of the Twisted Earth Starfield(13th), she had never felt so on edge.
It wasn't because of the danger.
Exiting the Void Portal, she saw the icy steel hallway. It was incredibly spacious, sufficient to safely funnel some of the largest beasts in the Grand Cyclic Stellar Region. There was a damp feeling in the air, and her eyes adjusted to the low lighting with frightening quickness as she channeled her Spiritual Power through them.
At the sides of the hallway were several doors forged from steel, possessing multiple lock mechanisms that required specific circulation of one's Spiritual Energy to access. They littered the hallway. Looking back, she saw a long stretch that kept going for several hundred meters.
Despite entering the Void Portal alongside others, she found herself alone. This was something she had expected.
It wasn't the feeling of being alone.
Clink! Clack! Doosh!
Her eyes widened slightly, her grip holding her bullwhip with greater strength when the door directly beside her opened. It was casually opened, and with a calm, relaxed gait, a male of average height walked out with a mask firmly placed on his face. A symbol was engraved on his mask; it was composed of three spirals—one at the top, one at the bottom left, and one at the bottom right; they interconnected and gave the illusion of movement. The center of all three spirals held the most notable detail, possessing a star-shaped mark with longer vertical rays.
"Huh?" The masked man was confused. He saw a masked woman staring at him but was unable to process the situation clearly enough. Who was this? Why was she here?
Whoosh.
The bullwhip in Wu Jinyan's hands moved swiftly, lashing across the man's neck. His cultivation base was at the Gravity Emission Phase, the Sixth Stage of the Astral Core Realm, and while this might be an imposing cultivation level in typical settings, when facing a genuine Ascended being, a true Venerable, he was but an ant before a boot.
The bullwhip lash was swift, silent, and ferocious. His neck couldn't withstand a single strike as it landed, severing his head from his body before he could even elicit the slightest sound of surprise. While his head began to dissipate from the infused Mystic Power, the masked man still had enough time for one last thought: "She has such wild hair."
While it was an irrelevant thought in the grand scheme of things, to this masked man, it was the last thought he'd have in life.
Wu Jinyan's eyes flashed as she shot into the opened door, her eyes scouring about as if to find more victims for her bullwhip. When she entered, she had indeed found what she was looking for, as four other masked figures were handling various formations and objects. She didn't hesitate to whip about, and their four lives all ended before they could even react.
Shortly after clearing the room, she inspected a few of the glass vials and formations these cultivators were operating. There was a smell of blood in the air, dense and pungent. "An essential blood refinery?" She concluded as her eyes narrowed upon a vial of refined essence blood. It belonged to a beast of the shark lineage, cultivated and enhanced through various methods and exuding enriched lifeforce.
It wasn't the exploration of the unknown.
She hurriedly found a wall, firmly placing a palm-sized glass sphere against it that melted into the surroundings. Then, she rushed out, her eyes darting about. She waited with her hand tightly wound against the grip of her bullwhip, ready to exact a swift end to any cultivator that was freely roaming these halls.
No one came, and soon, her spatial ring glinted with a sparkle of spiritual light. Inspecting the transmission, her mind was soon enlightened by the structure and size of this area. A gargantuan object was shown through her eyes, mapping the entirety of internal and external layout in excruciating detail.
If one saw it as a whole, one would instantly see its egg-like shape! It was none other than the interior and exterior of a Shadow Egg! Not just any Shadow Egg, the Shadow Egg that Wu Jinyan was currently located in!
She quickly located herself on the map, homing onto her signature—a minuscule dot within a vast super-structure. Then, other dots began to manifest, each barring a unique signature identifying their strength and real-time location. She instantly noted a particular one. It was sanguine in color, outrageously large when compared to the others, and seemingly three floors above her. She instinctively looked upwards, unaware that the figure above her was similarly looking down.
Then, more dots began to manifest. They began to change from their dull colors, becoming green and red spots of varying sizes. The green was an indicator of the innocents, while the red was all active combatants. They, too, had varying sizes based on their strength.
There wasn't a single red dot of the sanguine aura's size. Wu Jinyan heaved a breath of relief that had been pent up in her chest.
"It worked," she quietly said in awe. Wei Wuyin's means were absolutely world-shaking and mind-boggling. She hadn't felt the slightest trace of Spiritual Aura despite the entire Shadow Egg being mapped out perfectly. Moreover, this differentiated enemies from allies and innocent captives.
It was as if Wei Wuyin knew a method to easily sort them out, and she couldn't help but recall that handsome face with soul-stirring silver eyes.
BOOM!!!
An explosion occurred in the upper decks. She inspected the map and saw a rapidly moving sanguine dot racing toward the largest red one. Moreover, all red dots vanished as it passed them, while the green ones transformed into rays of light that shot out of the Shadow Egg map, exiting its sensory range.
She calmed herself down as she turned to a door. "Seven red dots, two green." She noted the location, and by estimating their size, there was a Mystic Star Phase expert here; she rushed in with a vicious palm strike to the door, unleashing ferocious Mystic Power. The door bent and then shot backward, smashing a red dot as it soared across the room. Then, it vanished.
When she entered, the crumpled door was dripping with fresh blood and falling bone fragments.
CRACK!
No longer bothering about stealth, she launched vicious strikes aimed at their vitals. The heads of those at the Astral Core Realm were smashed into a bloody gush while the Mystic Star Phase expert, a fellow female, tried to react, but who was Wu Jinyan?
She was Venerable Bloodtorrent, a figure wanted by four Starfields, a name that other Venerables feared as she freely acted to plunder, steal, and live. She unleashed a Mystic Art, her whip transforming into a gushing river of sanguine light that cracked onto the body of the female expert. She cried out painfully, cut short by her body exploding into bloody gore.
She was dead.
It certainly wasn't the fear of combat.
Wu Jinyan flashed across the room, finding two figures segregated by shackles tethered to the floor and walls. A sickly middle-aged woman and a young woman.
"Elves?"
The latter's eyes stared at her with vigilance. The woman's eyes exuded a bright, intelligent light that was hard to find. It seemed she realized that Wu Jinyan wasn't like the other women, and despite seeing such a bloody scene, she didn't shiver or retreat out of fear.
Wu Jinyan checked the map. She realized this stretch of hallway only had a single Exalted level cultivator, and they were here guarding mortals? Moreover, they weren't even in the Astral Core Realm.
Elves were considered inferior cultivators. Despite being here for thousands of years, elves have been unable to ascend to the Mystic Ascendant Realm successfully, and this caused their status to reach an all-time low. If it wasn't for the Everlore Association establishing the Elven Sanctuary, they would've been reduced to slaves and servants for the affluent and eccentric.
Wu Jinyan didn't think too heavily about the why. She brought out two grey and white talismans and tossed them toward the two prisoners. They couldn't even react before they were plastered on their bodies. The talismans exuded a gentle radiance, a wisp of enriched lifeforce surged into their bodies, and the sickly complexion of the woman was melted away by the glow of health. Whatever condition she was afflicted with was cured instantly.
Then, the young woman was stunned and cried out as her body felt lighter. She attempted to grab the middle-aged woman desperately, tears swelling within her eyes, but before she could do anything, a powerful void aura shifted them away through the walls.
"..." Wu Jinyan furrowed her brows slightly as she gazed at their previous location. Then, she took a deep breath and darted out the door, finding masked figures running away in fear, some even saw her, and her eyes became incredibly glacial.
A torrent of death and blood tainted the walls of the hallway alongside the crackle of a whip.
She wasn't on edge because of the danger or being alone or entering the unknown or the fear of combat, but because this was the first time that she felt like her soul was light, that she was cultivating on a road of blood and death purely for the sake of it, that the abilities that she strove to cultivate had a use that made her feel…good.
It was the mission that made her on edge, a mission not to just kill or steal or conquer, but a mission to save. A first for her, and it was surprisingly...liberating.
"KILL!" With bullwhip in hand, she saved lives.