Divine Arsenal 2: Dual Weapon Cultivation

by Dante King

  “You’re wrong,” I said, grinning.

  Oh yeah. He definitely knew something was up. “About which part?”

  I took a step forward, making a fist and hitting my palm. “I don’t need a weapon, asshole. I am a weapon!”

  Eric Casts Mana Shield!

  The shimmering plates of magic appeared over my hands. Plini, poor stupid Plini, took a step to the side as I sprang forward, dodging a blow that never came. I didn’t attack him—I no longer cared about Plini. This wasn’t about him—this was about me. About unlocking the next level of my power, so close I could almost taste it.

  I didn’t care how I did it, or how it made me look. I wanted to win, god damn it!

  I shot past Plini, making for the destroyed front gate of the town like a bat out of hell. As I reached the rubble, I swung with a gauntleted fist, putting every ounce of magical energy I had into the blow. The crumbled overhang gave like tissue paper, spraying bits of rubble all over the path leading to the town.

  Behind me, I felt Plini stiffen. “Hyde,” he said, his voice somewhere between amusement and disbelief. “What the fuck are you doing?”

  I whirled around, the forest brimming behind me like the background of a photo. I stretched out a hand, and Lyra disappeared in a shimmer, the snake spear forming across the ground in the space of a blink.

  I felt my harem girls gasp—I’d never transformed them into a weapon before. It had always been their will, not mine. Which was a mistake the Peak Supreme God wouldn’t have made.

  A small flow of magic, and the snake spear snapped to my hand like it was magnetized. Not that I needed the weapon—but I needed Plini to see me needing a weapon.

  “Come and get me, bastard!” I yelled, laughing madly as I hopped down from the rubble.

  As Plini’s shocked cries deepened into rage, I snickered and continued on. I know it looks bad, I thought, grinning. But this asshole’s not going to know what hit him!

  I raced into the night, quite literally running for my life.

  Chapter 20

  It has to be stated that what happened next wasn’t my fault.

  As I booked it into the woods, the armored plates around my wrists glowing like beacons for Plini to follow, I’d essentially given up the ghost. Plini had won the battle—the town was his, to put to the torch and take its citizens as prisoners. If he’d thought about it for ten seconds, he’d have realized it was the logical, evil course of business—take the harem as prisoners, destroy the town, flush Eric Hyde out at your leisure. By running, I’d given up the game. The Hollow Frog Guild had won.

  Only I knew Plini couldn’t let it go at that. I’d killed his precious mentee, the oh-so-bright pupil with an inconvenient addiction to murdering helpless people and filling their Cores with evil black shit. As his rage-filled roar cut through the night, I let out a gleeful yell and dove into the treeline. The bastard was hot on my heels, tearing through the forest like a bat out of Hell.

  He could have won, easily. But he chose to lose. Because he just couldn’t let me escape.

  “Eric, what are you doing!?” Lyra’s voice echoed in my head, full of worry. The redhead had only just now recovered from the shock of feeling herself forcibly shunted into her weapon form, and still sounded a little disoriented. “You can’t just abandon the town like that! I was born there!”

  I didn’t have time to explain. “Trust me,” I replied, not able to spare the words to speak. “I have a plan. Just stick with me, okay?”

  Her assent was wordless in my head. Still, I could tell Lyra didn’t like it—and she didn’t like being turned into a weapon as a surprise. I’d have to make it up to her later with some long, sweet one on one time.

  I plunged deeper into the woods, racing between the trees under cover of night. To a casual observer it would have looked like a mad dash, like flight without anything resembling a plan—which was exactly what I wanted Plini to think.

  “Come back and fight me, little cultivator!” Plini’s sonorous voice carried over the trees, coming from somewhere far off and behind me. “I have not yet avenged my pupil!”

  Keep following me, you bastard, I thought, slowing down just a touch. Plini could move, that I knew from experience, but he wasn’t pushing himself to the maximum in order to follow me. Meaning he considered this section of the fight to be extra innings—a little dessert to be savored on top of the meal that was defeating me and my harem of babes.

  Finally, I reasoned I’d run far enough. I willed the armored plates over my hands to fade, releasing the Mana Shield spell. The glow that had surrounded me faded, plunging the woods around me into darkness. I continued on at a slower pace, willing my eyes to adjust faster to the dim light. The faint crunching sounds of Plini moving through the brush could be heard, though between the trees he could have been a football field away or just behind me.

  I just had to keep calm. And open my senses.

  The Black Core vibrated in my chest as I concentrated, feeling the woods around me. The next level of cultivation lay so close that I could taste it—and whatever pulsed within me was one hell of a big upgrade. I knew I could reach it with a little elbow grease, all I needed was to keep concentrating and opening my senses to the maximum. Once I fully sensed the energy flowing through my Black Core, understanding it at the deepest level possible, I’d grow in power—and maybe I’d have a chance to beat Plini.

  The sound of running water reached my ears. It was faint at first, barely perceptible on the edge of my hearing, but it told me I was heading in the right direction. I quickened my pace, picking my way carefully through the trees now, careful not to give myself away. I could hear Plini getting angrier and angrier somewhere behind me, enraged that I’d led him so far away from the town.

  Hopefully my girls and the remaining villagers were able to quell the rest of the flames. I hadn’t even realized when I snatched up Lyra that I might have been taking their strongest weapon against the maelstrom from them. But they’d be alright. Besides, it was just buildings. If the town had to die in order to make me stronger, then the town could burn.

  The sound of running water grew sharper in my ears. With my enhanced senses, I could detect everything about it—from the most ample species of fish swimming in its depths to the composition of the stones that made up the river bed. I grasped it on a deep, instinctive level—and Lyra’s snake spear reacted to it like it was made of the same stuff. After all, both were of the Element of Water.

  “Eric?” Lyra’s voice was hesitant inside my mind. “Did you run all the way to the Kang River!?”

  This was indeed the southernmost bend of the same river that ran near Jinshu. I’d seen its curves on a map back in the village—and I’d been surprised to see that the same water ran so closely to both settlements. A stone bridge stretched from one bank to the next, nearly the twin of the one I’d seen on the road to Jinshu.

  “Here we go,” I told Lyra, settling in the center of the bridge. “Do me a favor, and be quiet for a minute, would you?”

  The sentiment shocked Lyra into stillness. I stepped into that silence, sitting cross-legged on the stones and opening my mind. The Black Core reverberated with my heartbeat, pulsing in time with the world around me. I reached deep into the depths of the flowing river, expanding my knowledge along with my power.

  They say you can never swim in the same river twice, I thought, a soaring feeling filling my chest. I finally understand what they mean. Gods, this world is so wonderful…

  I lay there, basking in my newfound understanding beneath the moon. It felt like ages had passed when I heard the sound of a twig snapping, but in reality, it couldn’t have been more than a few minutes.

  I opened my eyes. Plini stood at the end of the bridge, staring at me with murder in his eyes.

  “You ran from me,” he said, striding slowly over the stones. One of his legs moved with a slight limp—he must have hurt himself chasing me through the woods. Strange that he wouldn’t stop and use his cultivation to
heal up. “You turned tail and just… ran away. Like a little rabbit.”

  He sounded oddly offended. As if the honor of someone who looked the other way for murder and human trafficing could actually be besmirched by a little retreat.

  I sighed and stretched, rising to my feet. “I had to do a little thinking,” I said, lifting the snake spear. “Sorry to leave you in the lurch—it was an emergency, I promise.”

  Plini shook his head, uncomprehending. One more heavy step and he lunged, thrusting the jet-black sword for the killing blow. It was a brilliant strike: fast as a whip crack, without a single tell that the cultivator was about to strike. It should have killed me instantly, leaving me as dead as the stones on which I stood.

  But as he hit, I was no longer there.

  I flowed like water around Plini, dodging his attack with far more grace than I’d been able to muster back in the town. In the pale moonlight the man appeared to be moving in slow motion, the muscles of his face deepening from surprise into anger.

  “You’ve leveled up,” he grunted, looking not at me but the Black Core. “Good. That’ll make your treasure even more valuable!”

  Again and again he attacked, charging across the bridge like a bull. There was no longer any slow savoring or subtlety to Plini’s technique—these were the strikes of a man who was well and truly over this fight. He wanted me to die, and he wanted it now.

  I refused to oblige.

  With a roar, he finally overextended himself. The edge of his dark blade sizzled past my head, and I managed to catch the hilt with the butt end of the snake spear. The weapon nearly — oh so nearly! — fell from his fingers, twisted like a knotted rope in his hands.

  “No,” Plini grunted, pissed off now. “You don’t get to fight like a man! Not after you ran like a coward!”

  “Look at you,” I smirked, really getting into it now. “A fucking murderer lecturing me about the rules. Why is it the only thing cultivators care about is whether or not people are following the right protocol?”

  Plini had heard more than enough of my philosophizing. “Die!” he snarled, aiming a double back and forth slash at my knees that would have severed my legs if they’d connected. I danced out of the way, deflecting the second strike with the silver snake’s head at the end of my spear.

  “Seriously!” I laughed, enjoying how I was teasing the man. “You can kill, steal and rape your way across the province, do whatever you want to the common people—grind them beneath your heel if that’s what you want. But the second you start using underhanded tactics in a duel, suddenly everyone’s a big old baby about it. Whatever happened to ‘all’s fair in love and war?’”

  Plini took a step back, exhausted for the moment. The man seemed shocked that I was actually holding my own—like I’d reached a level high enough to resist him. Only I couldn’t be as strong as he was. It made no sense. I saw him look from me to the snake spear, guessing that my connection with Lyra amplified my powers.

  In that, he was right on the money. Too bad it wouldn’t help him.

  “You’ve decided to abandon the path of honor?” Plini laughed cruelly, feigning more weariness than he actually felt. With my enhanced senses, I could tell the man readied himself for a surprise strike. “Then you truly are lost, Eric Hyde. You have nothing now!”

  “I have what my master gave me,” I said, laughing in the cultivator’s face. “And for the first time since I got to this world, I feel like I’m finally using his lessons for what they’re worth!”

  I twisted away, anticipating Plini’s next swing. He still took it, which infuriated him. His face twisted in pure rage at my refusal to die. We danced around each other, neither inflicting a single hit. He hadn’t hurt me—but I hadn’t hurt him, either. It must have been driving him mad.

  So mad that he didn’t notice the way I’d been leading him to the center of the bridge.

  I got overconfident. Plini faked a sword swing, then slammed a boot down onto the stones with a triumphant roar. A wave of darkness like the one Seth had commanded cascaded over the bridge, knocking me to my knees. I was back up on my feet in a flash, but now the cultivator smelled blood.

  “You think this little upgrade will let you beat me?” Plini closed a fist, gathering more energy. This time he’d take no chances, I knew. He wouldn’t stop until I was dead. “You’re weak, Hyde. Leaning on whores and degenerates to augment your power? Violating the rules of cultivation? You make me sick.” He glared down at me, the corners of his mouth curling in a smirk. “I don’t even know why the Peak Supreme God chose you to represent his will.”

  “Actually, I’ve only just figured that out,” I snapped back.

  Plini let out a chuckle. “Tell me then, before you die,” he commanded.

  So I did.

  “Eliezer chose me,” I told the man, holding nothing back, “because I’m the only cultivator in this world in possession of both a penis and a brain.”

  Plini stared at me flatly for a moment. He began to laugh.

  “You’ve got balls, Hyde, I’ll give you that,” the cultivator said, wiping a tear from his eye. “Too bad it won’t save you—”

  “I’m smart enough to know I can’t beat you in a straight fight,” I said, finishing my sentence. “Which is why I decided to run away. So I can do this.”

  Plini’s eyes widened a fraction. In the last moment, I believe he realized what was coming—and just as clearly, knew he had no way of stopping it.

  I slammed the snake’s head spear into the stones at my feet—and released the energy I’d been gathering since I began meditating on the bridge.

  All that water. The whole Kang River—a mighty stream, so long that it touched multiple villages in its path. Some of which were entire days away.

  All that power had been flowing through me. And now I released it back to where it came from.

  The bridge rumbled beneath us. Both Plini and I turned to see what looked like a mountain looming over the horizon—but was actually a wave. The entire Kang River, diverted from its natural flow to attack this single bridge.

  I met Plini’s eyes and grinned. I cast my final spell of the night.

  Eric Casts Mana Shield!

  I cast the spell through Lyra, amplifying it. A magical aura resembling armored plate snapped over the Spear, over me, and over my half of the bridge, rooting it to the ground. Plini’s half, on the other hand, was completely defenseless against what was coming.

  The wall hit us head on, ripping away the world. The last glimpse I got of Plini was like watching the man slam into a concrete wall head-on. For an instant, blood splattered against the Mana Shield—then it was washed away by a tidal wave of water.

  It flowed for what felt like ages, completely covering the cocoon of shielding Lyra and I had created. When the maelstrom finally ebbed, the Kang River began to flow normally again. Plini was nowhere to be seen.

  The Mana Shield collapsed. The remains of the bridge sank into the water, and I jumped to the side to avoid getting wet. I managed to crawl onto the bank, despite my exhaustion, and lay on my back staring up at the stars.

  A shimmer filled my eyes, and Lyra lay next to me, panting. “Holy shit,” she whispered, pressing her naked body against me. Every square inch of her was soaked through to the bone — she quickly began to shiver. “That was insane, Eric. I’ve never seen cultivation used like that before.”

  I could tell Lyra didn’t fully like it. I’d caused a lot of chaos by diverting the river—the nearby villages would be thrown into trouble. But none of that mattered. Would Eliezer have scoffed at diverting a little water to take out an enemy? I think not.

  And from now on, I was going to start acting a lot more like the Peak Supreme God.

  “Come on,” I grunted, forcing myself to a sitting position after a few minutes. My body ached, but it wasn’t like it was going to get any better until I got my lips around a healing potion. “We’ve got a long walk back to the town. Let’s see how much of it my harem managed to s
ave.”

  Wearily, clinging to me, Lyra accompanied me through the woods. By the time we were halfway there, her hands were in my robes.

  “They can wait a little longer, right?” Lyra asked, begging me with her eyes. “The town is fine. Please, Eric, I need this…”

  Grinning, I pinned Lyra against a nearby tree and began kissing her. “So do I,” I admitted, savoring the redhead’s groan as she spread her legs for me. “We’ll head back soon enough.”

  As Lyra’s cries of passion filled the night, I realized a brand new truth. I might be a jerk when I followed Eliezer’s example, but my girls would always get off on it. As long as I got the job done.

  Victory was sweet.

  Chapter 21

  By the time Lyra and I made it back to the town, we had new visitors.

  A familiar cart lay against the half-collapsed entrance, right next to the big ass hole I’d punched in the front gates with my Mana Shield gloves. Inside the town, new arrivals were helping the survivors of the attack put out fires and repair buildings. I recognized one immediately—I’d been waiting to see her again ever since Jinshu.

  Kim turned at the sound of Lyra and I’s arrival, a smile spreading across her face. “Eric Hyde!” she yelled, beaming. “The victorious warrior returns!”

  Ragged cheers rose from the villagers at my arrival. People emerged from half-destroyed buildings, eager to be the first to greet me, but Kim beat them all to the punch. The beauty raced across the thoroughfare and jumped into my arms, giving me a hero’s welcome back to the town.

  “My father was thrilled when I told him about wanting to come with you,” the bartender murmured against my ear, grinning. “He’s graciously accepted your offer to make me a cultivator—and he wants you to do it as soon as possible.”