Rewinding the white cow back to when Freya and Sonia met on the street.
Catching a clear view of Sonia's appearance from afar, Tamashi couldn't help but frown. "Why is there another one..."
Freya asked, "What?"
"In the very first zone after we were separated, I ran into a red-haired sword sorcerer who looked a lot like this one. I thought she was the Sword Princess Yaxiu knows, so I went up and asked her, 'Are you the Sword Princess?' In the end, she trembled with rage, screamed 'I am not the Sword Princess!' and chased me down to kill me. Feeling like I might have offended her, I didn't fight back and fled straight into another zone to avoid her."
"That really was your fault." The Veela nodded solemnly. "Could every red-haired sword sorcerer be the Sword Princess? Could they all be Yaxiu's lovers? How could that be possible? If there were such a shortcut, I'd go dye my hair and learn swordsmanship tomorrow."
Tamashi thought so too, but she took another look. "Still, this one really looks like the Sword Princess Yaxiu used to transform into..."
"Impossible, impossible. You read the diary too. The Sword Princess and the others are already legendary sorcerers now—they can't enter the Distant Sky Realm at all. How could we possibly run into the Sword Princess here?" Freya shook her head repeatedly. "With sorcerers from all six nations gathered right now, it's no surprise that a few red-haired sword sorcerers would show up."
As they spoke, Sonia had already arrived before them. To repay the help of the starlight body, Tamashi and Freya attacked Sonia at the same time.
However, Sonia didn't engage them. Stepping off the wall, she leaped directly over them and said offhandedly, "I'm going over to help him. If you want to die, come after me."
Sonia had also seen Yaxiu bail them out; she had no interest in undoing his sudden burst of kindness.
Yet if these two heard she was going to help Yaxiu and still attacked, she wouldn't mind cleaning up such ungrateful trash for him.
"Huh?" The Veela blinked in surprise, then quickly chased after her and said, "We want to go too! He helped us, and we want to help him too!"
"Yeah." Tamashi nodded along.
Sonia glanced at the holy grail fragments in Freya's arms; they were already more than half complete. There was no need for her to fight over the completed holy grail—she could gather the rest simply by continuing to pillage fragments from other sorcerers.
On that point, her claim of wanting to help Yaxiu was truly convincing. The area around Yaxiu would surely gather the most sorcerers, meaning the closer she got, the more dangerous it would be—she could even draw away some of the pressure on Yaxiu.
As for Tamashi, although she had a very sultry figure, Sonia could clearly sense her keen, righteous spirit.
This was mutual resonance between combat sorcerers; the more indomitable a battle fanatic was, the more keenly they could feel the will of their own kind.
This sharpness usually manifested in sword sorcerers. Sonia couldn't sense it in the Witch, for instance—rather than an exhilarating battle, the Witch took far more pleasure in executions conducted under total control.
A sorcerer with this sharpness had to align their words with their deeds; otherwise, that sharpness would rust, and their sorcery might never advance again.
"All right, keep up!" Sonia nodded. Turning around to see a mob of greedy sorcerers rushing forward, she carved straight through them along the way, leaving Tamashi and Freya's eyes sparkling behind her.
"You're so strong!" Freya said excitedly. "I'm Freya, and she's Tamashi. What about you?"
Tamashi parted her lips to speak, but gave up in the end. Xifulin and Annan had repeatedly warned them never to expose their real names in the Void Realm and to use codenames instead; the Veela nodded every single time and forgot every single time.
Sonia had originally intended to use a codename as well, but seeing that they both seemed to be using real names, using a codename would make her look overly cautious. "I'm Sonia."
"Sonia!" Freya asked crisply. "Tamashi ran into someone who looked very much like you earlier. Are there a lot of red-haired female sword sorcerers where you're from?"
Sonia blinked, thinking that the one Tamashi ran into must have been Niya from the Nation of Stars.
However, the Nation of Stars was still a secret, so naturally she wouldn't disclose it. She simply played along: "Yeah, there are lots of red-haired sword sorcerers where I'm from, and quite a few look like me."
Freya and Tamashi came to an understanding, realizing that using 'red-haired sword sorcerer' as the criterion for identifying the Sword Princess was indeed flawed, so they suppressed any thought of asking further.
After all, as a legendary sorcerer, the Sword Princess was unlikely to appear here in the first place. Now that they knew red-haired sword sorcerers were a common trope, they naturally wouldn't go around asking everyone they met whether they were Yaxiu's lover.
They didn't recognize the name Sonia, since Yaxiu only ever wrote 'Sword Princess' in his diary, never her real name.
"Why are you helping him?" Freya asked. "Did he help you before too, so you owe him?"
"No, he owes me," Sonia said, raising her eyebrows. "And he owes me a great deal."
"He's headed inside. I'll go ahead—you two catch up."
......
In the bank lobby, though Yaxiu was full of questions, he couldn't speak a single word. What was worse, several other walls of the bank had already been breached, and sorcerers were flooding in from every direction.
"Freya on the left, Tamashi on the right, I'll take the front," Sonia quickly assigned. "Dog man coordinates from the center."
Huh? Yaxiu blinked, then immediately realized Sonia wanted to conceal his name.
After all, if he could obtain the holy grail, the less personal information he leaked, the better.
Still, he faintly sensed that Freya and Tamashi hadn't recognized him... which was evident from how they acted more familiarly with the Sword Princess.
Not a big problem; they could recognize each other once he left his starlight body.
Still, why call me 'dog man'? Is the alias 'Observer' not good enough?
Yaxiu looked up to meet Sonia's gaze. The Sword Princess had narrowed her eyes slightly, a faint smirk playing on her lips. The piercing glint in her ruby eyes made Yaxiu feel genuinely guilty.
What's that look for? Whether in reality or the Void Realm, I'm pure as ice and chaste as jade, conservative and self-respecting! Don't you dare slander me!
"The holy grail is inside!"
Battle erupted in an instant. The three fell back to the vault door, facing the mob of sorcerers rushing in from all directions.
Sonia went without saying—even mid-combat, her swordsmanship continued to improve. Rather, the fruits of learning she had accumulated over the past several months were unfolding bit by bit. Her sword momentum was consummate and ferocious, with hardly anyone surviving a single clash against her, drawing infinitely close to the legendary realm!
Yet what astonished Yaxiu even more were Freya and Tamashi!
Tamashi no longer relied on her Grey Fox blade. In her left hand, she held a massive triangular prism shield that spun at high speed when blocking, functioning almost like an abrasive turbine, as brutally violent as a meat grinder; in her right hand, she wielded a rapier, piercing enemies' throats and eyeballs with swift, deadly precision, as vicious as a scorpion's stinger.
Frankly, relying on exotic weapons to boost combat capability was not recommended, as it made progressing through sorcery realms exceedingly difficult.
Yet thinking of Tamashi's inhuman talent for physical arts—able to clash head-on with Sanctuary sorcerers with a mere mortal body—Yaxiu felt that even if she bludgeoned people with a Lalafell, she might still smash her way into the legendary realm.
If Tamashi's combat prowess was something Yaxiu had anticipated, Freya was entirely beyond his imagination.
At first glance, the Veela's fighting style seemed to consist of punches and kicks, with every sorcerer she attacked flying backward. Yaxiu initially thought she had specialized in the fist and claw faction, but upon closer inspection, he realized her strikes didn't make contact with their bodies at all!
The enemies were flinging themselves backward!
This was certainly no act. Yaxiu could see clearly that as the Veela struck toward them, intense discomfort and symptoms of pain manifested in the targets; before she even touched them, they harmed themselves and flew backward.
Freya's mastery over the mind faction had reached the point where she could hypnotize an opponent's body into producing the physiological reaction of 'I'm being pummeled,' turning an 'illusion' that never happened into 'reality'!
He could not fathom at all how Freya—who wasn't even a sorcerer over half a year ago, a Veela who didn't even possess a single sorcery spirit—had made her way here step by step to become a Sanctuary sorcerer capable of holding her own.
It was truly... wonderful.
Though Yaxiu still harbored many questions, such as how Tamashi and Freya had met, or how they had come to know the Sword Princess...
...seeing the confidence on Freya's face and Tamashi's ever-undaunted spirit made him feel that none of those details mattered.
It was just that finding out all his friends had secretly become so remarkable gave Yaxiu a tiny pang of melancholy.
Tasked with coordinating from the center, Yaxiu hardly even had chances to make a move, only needing to plug a few gaps for them here and there.
Boom!
Suddenly, a wondrous ripple of light welled up behind them. The ripple ignored all barriers, draining the color from everything it passed, only returning to normal a moment later.
Yaxiu glanced back into the vault and found that the Rainbow Holy Grail, which had been radiating dazzling light moments ago, had now turned into a pure black and white. Though not glaring or dazzling, it was all the more impossible to look away from.
Sonia and Yaxiu exchanged a glance. Yaxiu nodded slightly, opened the vault, and stepped inside, while the three of them continued to stand guard outside.
Freya immediately looped her arm around the Sword Princess's. "Sonia, Sonia! Was that guy just now your lover?"
The Paw-Extending Sword Saint wasn't quite used to the Veela's instant familiarity. "Sort of."
"What do you mean 'sort of'?"
"Because he's still on probation! I'm very dissatisfied with him, so it depends on his future performance!" At the thought of Niya, Sonia couldn't help snorting softly.
"What happens if he fails probation?" Freya asked with concern. "Will you stop loving him?"
"Of course not! If he fails probation, he enters the punishment phase!" Sonia bit her lower lip. "Until I discipline him into exactly what I want!"
"Ooh, ooh!" The Veela nodded eagerly, eyes gleaming. "Can you teach me? Even though I'm very satisfied with my lover, I want him to become even better too!"
"No problem. I'm still in the planning phase anyway—we can compare notes when we have time."
Tamashi watched Sonia warm up to Freya so quickly, thinking this was probably a Veela's special talent.
In their team, relations among Xifulin, Annan, and Tamashi weren't particularly harmonious, yet all of them got along wonderfully with the Veela. In particular, when Tamashi first joined the team, Freya had disliked Tamashi the most, yet Freya was also the quickest to become friends with her.
It was as though once Freya decided to abstain from men, all her charm had shifted into making female friends.
......
Yaxiu entered the vault to find Feili holding the decolorized holy grail without moving an inch. The grail was already filled to the brim with decolorizing nectar, the surface tension stretched to its limit.
He blinked at her a few times, but Feili showed no response whatsoever, so he had no choice but to reach out and take the holy grail.
Yes, Yaxiu had decided to drink the decolorized holy grail himself rather than share it with Feili.
Even with the Sword Princess right outside, he still resolved to keep it all to himself. After all, even if Yaxiu was willing to share with Feili, she wasn't a sorcerer, so drinking it would be a total waste; the Sword Princess certainly could drink it, but Yaxiu faced the trials of Hell, making allocating the resource to him the highest priority.
Furthermore, Yaxiu had to consider Feili's feelings. Feili might be happy enough if he drank it, but if he shared the decolorized holy grail with the Sword Princess while Feili didn't get a single drop—to use an inappropriate analogy, that would be using his mistress's money to support his wife. Just thinking about it made Yaxiu want to beat himself to death.
Yet just as Yaxiu took the decolorized holy grail, a single drop of decolorizing nectar spilled over, falling onto his left hand.
Thud!
As if a heavy sledgehammer had smashed into his soul, Yaxiu collapsed dazed to the ground, while Feili finally broke free from her frozen state.
Paying no heed to the holy grail, she rushed to help Yaxiu up. "I couldn't move at all just now until you touched the holy grail... Your hand!"
Yaxiu looked at his left hand, which was gradually fading into nothingness.
It wasn't vanishing, but losing its color bit by bit, like pigment dissolving in water.
"The Prime Angel wants to slaughter all the sorcerers by a demon's side." He figured out the cause and effect in an instant. "A demon cannot condense the decolorized holy grail alone, and even after condensing it, they still cannot move until someone else touches it. At that moment, the decolorizing nectar overflows, draining all color from whichever sorcerer can reach the demon... Obviously, anyone capable of touching the demon at that point has to be the sorcerer the demon trusts most!"
Yaxiu slumped back against the vault's reinforced door, a wry smile on his face. "Maybe this is the end a greedy sorcerer deserves."
"Then what do we do!?" Feili panicked. "Your hand is almost gone!"
"I don't know. I can feel that my soul arm is already gone..." Yaxiu slid down along the vault door to the floor. Glancing at the gap carved out around the lock, he subconsciously pushed his hand out through the opening. "I don't know much about souls."
Outside, Sonia saw Yaxiu's hand reaching out and realized something had gone wrong inside.
Knowing that the decolorized holy grail was finished, however, the sorcerers outside mounted an even more frenzied assault. She couldn't leave her post at all, able only to slaughter the sorcerers with one hand while holding Yaxiu's hand with the other.
"There has to be a way!" Feili turned to look back at the decolorized holy grail floating in midair. "If you drink from the holy grail, could it heal your soul?"
Yaxiu shook his head. "I suspect if any other sorcerer touches the holy grail, it will only trigger more nectar to spill."
"I'll feed you!" Feili retrieved the holy grail and tilted it toward Yaxiu's mouth.
Yet the laws of gravity seemed to fail at that moment; not a single drop of decolorizing nectar fell. Not only that, even when Yaxiu stuck out his tongue to lick it, the decolorizing nectar actively pulled away!
Yaxiu was dumbfounded at the sight, almost wanting to laugh out loud. "Only demons can drink from the holy grail; no one else can even touch it. It seems the nectar truly can heal a fading soul—the Prime Angel really went to great pains to make sure we wouldn't survive."
"How can you not panic at all!" Feili was frantic and angry. "Your body is almost gone!"
Yaxiu glanced down at his body. The decolorization had already spread to his chest. It was a rather bizarre feeling, watching oneself fade away little by little.
Indeed, he was about to die, so why wasn't he afraid?
Just then, Yaxiu felt the Sword Princess tighten her grip on his hand slightly. Though devoid of any warmth, that familiar touch instantly soothed every bit of restlessness in his heart.
"Because the Sword Princess is right outside the door."
Yaxiu blinked. "When we met earlier, the Sword Princess recognized me at first glance. Just thinking about that makes me feel like death isn't all that frightening after all."
Feili froze. She glanced at his hand reaching out through the gap, lowered her head in silence for a moment, and suddenly said, "Actually, there might be a way to let you drink the decolorizing nectar."
Yaxiu started, exchanged a look with Feili, and immediately understood what she meant—he could even vaguely guess what was going through her mind.
If Yaxiu hadn't mentioned that the Sword Princess was right outside, Feili might have carried out the method directly. But knowing that, Feili gave the choice back to Yaxiu.
In truth, there wasn't much to deliberate on. Surviving came before everything, and drinking the decolorizing nectar would give him greater security in facing the trials of Hell later on. But... but...
Yaxiu's heart was in terrible turmoil, his grip tightening around the Sword Princess's hand.
A moment later, he made up his mind after all. Letting out a long breath, he blinked at Feili.
He had to be responsible for Feili, for Niya, for Rose, for Igola and Harvey, and even more for the future of the Sword Princess and the Witch!
He had to overcome this trap set by the Prime Angel. For them, there was nothing he couldn't cast aside!
Leaning down, Feili glanced once more at Yaxiu's hand reaching outside the door, an odd sensation swelling in her heart.
Tilting her neck back, she lifted the holy grail and drank. This time, the decolorizing nectar obediently flowed into her mouth until her cheeks puffed out.
Gazing at Yaxiu, the strange feeling in Feili's heart grew more and more intense. Cupping Yaxiu's face, she lowered her head gently, passing the decolorizing nectar into his mouth.
Outside, Sonia felt Yaxiu's hand suddenly squeeze hers tightly, as if terrified she would leave.
She was anxious too, wanting to go inside to see what had happened, but she had to guard the entrance. She could only squeeze and rub Yaxiu's hand to reassure him, murmuring with a soft scoff, "Dog man."
Chapter 918