Boom!
As the load-bearing pillars snapped, the five-story streetfront building collapsed with a deafening crash. Yaxiu, Diya, and Vichy bolted out just in time to avoid being buried alive.
Behind them lay a pile of ruins, but none of them dared linger for even a second. Spurring their bodies forward as fast as they could, they suddenly rolled forward in unison!
Boom!
Two invisible blades flew out from the debris, nearly slicing all three of them clean in half at the waist!
Heavy rubble exploded like toy blocks, and stepping out from the swirling smoke and dust was a tall woman in a formal gown. Her clothes were pristine, her hair immaculately combed, and every button was fastened in place; she looked like an orchestra conductor poised before a concert.
Yet such an elegant woman was dual-wielding a pair of long-handled, double-bladed battleaxes.
Even an orc wielding such a weapon could only manage one with both hands. It wasn't that an orc lacked the physical strength to dual-wield, but rather that the center of gravity of a double-bladed axe was concentrated at the head. In combat, the wielder didn't control the axe; they let the axe pull them along, relying on immense kinetic momentum to crush everything weaker beneath its weight. It combined the cutting edge of a blade with the devastating impact of a blunt weapon, and dual-wielding would only disperse that power.
Yet Longyuan utterly shattered the sorcerers' understanding of the world.
How were those battleaxes? They were clearly heavy broadswords, twin-bladed shields, and long-barreled firearms all at once!
They could slash out invisible shockwaves, block the vast majority of attacks, and even be hurled out like boomerangs only to fly right back!
Against Longyuan alone, Yaxiu's group might not even stand a chance—and there were two more demons of her caliber right beside her!
Suddenly, a figure stepped onto one of Longyuan's battleaxes. Longyuan swung her arm with tremendous force, and he kicked off with his slippers, launching across over a dozen meters like a cannonball. The wind caught his hood, blowing it back to reveal a mop of orange hair.
The demon Lehuai!
He thrust out a pair of bare palms in an ordinary, unadorned push, showing no regard for Yaxiu's sharp sword or Vichy's spear. Yet nobody dared underestimate the terrifying might contained within those hands!
When they had ganged up on him earlier, Lehuai hadn't even used his hands once from start to finish, holding his ground entirely through his footwork!
Gunfire erupted without warning, forcing Yaxiu to swing his blade to deflect bullets hailing from all directions.
Lehuai slapped the tip of Vichy's spear with one hand and caught Diya's fist with the other. A spiraling force surged from his palms, rattling Vichy so violently that her spear nearly slipped from her grip, while Diya was blasted straight backward through the air!
At the same moment, Longyuan leaped high into the sky, her twin axes descending like a falling guillotine!
Sword Flash!
Spear Flash!
In that split second, swordplay and spear craft were pushed to their absolute limits, supreme artistry performing a near-miraculous feat of turning despair into survival.
Yaxiu intercepted Longyuan's mountain-cleaving guillotine chop. The blade shrieked with an ear-grating wail that set his teeth on edge. Vichy spun her spear to knock Lehuai back, though the price was the spearhead being split clean in two by his bare palm.
Bang!
Just as they tried to use the recoil to leap backward, Yinzhi's gunshots tolled like a death knell, striking with deadly precision right at their most uncomfortable intervals.
Yaxiu felt sick to his stomach... When they were ganging up on Lehuai just now, you weren't shooting like this at all! Were you throwing the fight on purpose?!
Of course, Yaxiu understood perfectly well in his heart that Yinzhi hadn't gone easy earlier; it was simply that they themselves had been too weak!
To match their tempo, Yinzhi had been forced to lower her own standards, and even then, Lehuai had handled them with ease. Now, however, cooperating with Lehuai and Longyuan, she could unleash a barrage of fire without the slightest restraint, while Yaxiu's side had no way of withstanding the demons' combined assault.
Earlier, Yinzhi had been stuck with pig-headed teammates against a godly opponent. Now, she was fighting alongside godly teammates against pig-headed opponents.
Yaxiu didn't know what her experience was like, but as one of the pigs, his own experience had been thoroughly miserable from beginning to end.
Having been knocked back, Diya immediately grabbed three rows of roadside trash cans and hurled them through the air, shielding Yaxiu and Vichy from the deadliest hail of gunfire and buying them a momentary window to catch their breath and flee.
Yes—flee.
Having recognized the sheer disparity in strength, Yaxiu and the others knew without even thinking that a direct confrontation was impossible; a strategic retreat was their only option.
In any case, this place was vast, and their main objective was merely to survive. Why risk life and limb in a fight to the death with these demons?
As the saying went: when the enemy is in a hurry, don't you dare be in one!
Their calculations were sound, but the beings standing before them were genuine demons.
Longyuan wasn't a reckless bulldozer; she was a bulldozer with a brain.
As her battleaxes brought down one building after another, heaps of rubble and collapsed walls choked the streets, constantly slowing their retreat. Yet they had no choice but to push through the debris, or they would soon find themselves cordoned off and trapped like caged beasts!
Crack!
Yaxiu suddenly severed a nearby streetlight pole. Diya snatched it up and whipped it backward, but Lehuai leaped off a wall, dodging it effortlessly. Seeing the opening, Vichy instantly whirled around and thrust her broken shaft toward Lehuai while he was suspended in midair.
Smack!
Lehuai brought his slipper down on the shaft, pinning it underfoot as he remarked casually, "You don't have a spearhead."
"It can still kill," Vichy replied, her gaze ferocious. Spinning the shaft with both hands, she struck hard toward him. Lehuai sidestepped, clapping both palms together to coil around the shaft like flowing water, and yanked hard to pull Vichy toward him. Yet the sudden surge of strength sent him stumbling forward...
Vichy had simply let go of the spear and sprinted away.
She had sounded ready to fight to the death just a second ago, only to abandon her weapon and flee without hesitation!
"As expected of a prophecy sorcerer."
Lehuai tossed the spear shaft aside, the corners of his mouth curling up. "Her complete lack of a bottom line is cut from the exact same cloth as yours~"
"I'm currently aiming right at your kidney, so you'd better think carefully about what comes out of that filthy dog mouth of yours," Yinzhi retorted crossly as she hopped onto a mound of rubble.
She glanced toward the backs of the three fleeing figures ahead. "That woman has to stay."
"To interrogate her and find out which demon is backing her, right?" Lehuai mused. "Though Yejian isn't here right now. Could it be..."
"If it were Yejian, that'd be one thing. But if it isn't..."
Yinzhi paused, then chuckled. "Well, none of my business anyway. I only wanted to save him out of the goodness of my heart. After all, we share a life-and-death friendship from fighting side by side!"
"Wasn't the only enemy you fought side by side against me?" Lehuai ran up the wall onto the rooftop and said, "Let's go. Longyuan should be ready by now."
***
"Did they give up?" Diya glanced at the quiet street behind them, her shifting hair colors settling down slightly.
"Unlikely. Just keep running," Yaxiu said, slashing through a steel railing beside the road and tossing it to Vichy. "Vichy, why on earth are they hunting you?"
Vichy caught the steel pipe, twirled it twice, and shook her head. "I don't know either. Longyuan started screaming for my blood the moment she laid eyes on me, even though I've never met her before. However, my appearance now is identical to what it was in the past."
"On top of that, she called me the last owner of Dream Heaven," the Spectre Prophet added, her lips curling into a faint smile. "She's probably seen images of me before."
"As for why they're hunting me, we'll know soon enough... Longyuan did say earlier that 'there's no time left.'"
"Yinzhi mentioned earlier that there's an Inheritance Banquet coming up," Yaxiu said thoughtfully. "In other words, your existence is very likely to interfere with their contest over the inheritance."
"It all connects. To stop me from competing for the angel's final inheritance, the demons didn't hesitate to join forces just to get rid of me. That sounds..."
A crimson gleam flickered in Vichy's eyes. "Rather flattering, doesn't it~"
"Hold on a second. I know things are urgent, so Watcher, don't say a word." Diya turned to look at Vichy. "Who are you?"
"To think Master hadn't mentioned me to the mistresses." Vichy gave a polite nod. "You must be Mistress Witch. I am Master's personal maid, Vichy."
"She—"
"Don't," Diya said, casting a sideways glare at him, the chill in her eyes sending a shiver through his entire body. "Say a word."
Yaxiu obediently shut his mouth. Diya continued, "The two of you have been in the Nation of Stars all these months?"
"Indeed."
"Did anything happen between you? You know what I'm asking."
"Though I would gladly offer myself to Master—to warm his body and harmonize his desires—" Vichy sighed, "Master has consistently rejected my offers to share his bed."
Diya's brow furrowed slightly as she eyed Yaxiu with suspicion.
Yaxiu's eyes went wide... You're actually doubting my moral character on that front?!
Diya cleared her throat twice and asked, "Why do you call me mistress? This is our first time meeting, so how did you recognize me?"
"Because Master constantly talks about how much he loves Mistress Sword Princess and Mistress Witch, scolding me for coveting him and declaring that his body will only ever belong to the two mistresses, never giving a maid like me any chance to overstep." Vichy blinked playfully. "Mistress Witch, if you ever get tired in the future, you can always consider letting me sub in for you~"
"Is that really true...?" A blush crept onto Diya's face. She looked at Yaxiu with touched eyes, her hair color instantly turning clear and serene. "As for subbing in... it's not entirely out of the question, but there are others waiting in line ahead of you. You'll have to wait your turn."
Yaxiu couldn't hold it in any longer. "You're actually agreeing to that?!"
Vichy asked curiously, "How many people are in line? Do I need to take a number?"
Vroom... Vroom... Vroom...
Screeech—
As the roar of an engine drew rapidly nearer, the shrill squeal of rubber grinding against asphalt suddenly echoed ahead. A brightly colored sports car skidded to an abrupt halt on the highway right in front of them, burnt smoke wafting from the tires into the air.
Yaxiu and the others stared in disbelief as Longyuan stepped out of the vehicle, casually drawing two battleaxes from inside.
The entire city was empty—where had she gotten a car...?
In a flash of realization, Yaxiu remembered the auto dealership they had passed earlier.
There were no people or active vehicles in the city, but all the merchandise was still there.
There was no time to marvel at how demons were even better at utilizing modern urban amenities than modern people, because Longyuan had already hurled her battleaxes!
Rumble...
The buildings on both sides of the street were shattered one after another by the whirling battleaxes. Longyuan charged forward alongside the axes, leaving nothing but collapsed rubble in her wake!
Even if Yaxiu and the others managed to slip past Longyuan, crossing through the graveyard of a dozen collapsed buildings would be virtually impossible!
Behind them, Yinzhi and Lehuai had already caught up!
A tiger in front, wolves behind—a desperate struggle for survival!
The battleaxes had already returned to Longyuan's hands. Yinzhi's gunfire tolled like a funeral knell, and Lehuai leaped down from the rooftop. At this moment, they had nowhere left to run.
Only a miracle remained!
Yaxiu suddenly hurled his sword through the air. Arcing across nearly a hundred meters of debris, it struck cleanly into the asphalt right beside the sports car.
Then he wrapped his arms around Vichy's and Diya's waists, planting his other blade firmly into the ground!
'Heart Sword' as the guide, 'Earth Sword' as the path, 'Transference' to weave the law!
Miracle: Rush Forth!
In a single flash, they crossed over a hundred meters of distance and materialized directly beside the sports car. Vichy and Diya shoved Yaxiu into the passenger side, scrambled in after him, and sped away.
"A wise decision," Yinzhi praised. "I thought he'd try using a miracle to kill us~"
"Wise, but not wise enough." Longyuan didn't seem in a rush. "Abandoning the Spectre Prophet was clearly his only way out, yet he still believed he could create a miracle~"
"Isn't that fine? Miracles are the very essence of a sorcerer," Lehuai remarked. "Swaying with the wind is a fine quality, but unwavering determination often creates miracles. Still, treating even the Spectre Prophet as a companion really makes me wonder what kind of education he received."
Yinzhi suddenly remembered something. "Speaking of which..."
"Which country is he from again?"
***
"There's barely any fuel left."
Vichy's expression was grim. She glanced in the rearview mirror at Yaxiu, who was trembling all over from having broken his virtual wings, and asked, "How many chances do you have left?"
"One," Yaxiu said, holding Diya tightly as he fought through the agony. "What about you?"
"Used them all up. Two in the Holy Grail War, two while fleeing from Longyuan." Vichy brought the car to a stop, pushed the door open, and saw that Yaxiu needed Diya's support to stand. She stepped over to help hold him up from the other side. "They'll catch up soon."
"There's still me!" Diya said at once. "I can fight too!"
"You're different from us. Our virtual wings can regrow, but that's not a blessing—it's a curse," Vichy said. "If there is even the slightest alternative, Master would never let you suffer that kind of harm, Mistress."
"Besides, even if we gave it everything we had, we still might not be a match for those three demons. The gulf between us and them isn't something that one or two miracles can erase~"
Yaxiu caught the underlying implication in her tone. Catching his breath, he asked, "Vichy, what are you trying to say?"
"Their target has only ever been me from the start. You two were just dragged into this because of me."
Vichy spoke with calm detachment. "As long as I die, everything will naturally come to an end~"
Chapter 930