Immortal Kingdoms

A delicate hand plunged deep into his chest, tender fingers crowned by five sharp multicolored nails that clutched his beating heart and ripped it off to the outside world.

"M-my heart… G-give it b-back…"

The man was horrified. However, Wendy's expression was even paler, her breathing uneven as she stared at the beating heart in her hand.

"Wendy!" Patriarch Ye stepped out from the formation of tribe leaders, his expression solemn. He didn't wish for the young generation of their tribes to grow with the burden of taking another life, he wanted that burden for the warriors of the previous generations.

When they die, this sin will accompany them to the graves, allowing the next generation to carry on worry-free, their hearts placed and serene.

"We old fellows already sinned against the teachings of our ancestors, don't follow in our footsteps," he wanted to move forward and take the heart from Wendy's hand.

"Don't come closer," Wendy spoke in a shaky voice, struggling to maintain her calm as a feeling of disgust welled up inside her heart. Through the hole in the man's chest, she could even spot his internal organs and ruptured lungs as they continued to spill out blood.

A dense wave of nausea assaulted the young woman as she used her other hand to cover her apricot-pink lips. Swallowing her saliva that almost trickled down her mouth, she shook her head clean from any distractions.

"You…"

Patriarch Ye, the deputy general, the general, and the string of hidden tribes leaders felt a chill. Wendy's delicate fist tightened, and the beating heart was like a ripe and mellow tomato as it exploded in her hand.

Shock and despair overwhelmed the deputy general's eyes as their light dimmed. As for the general, he felt a wave of regret and relief wash him over, as that in Wendy's hand could have been his heart if only she had the resolve to kill back then.

"Pfft!"

Wendy bent to her waist and began to puke from nausea, a layer of mist covering her eyes. However, she could still feel the fresh sticky blood on her hands.

She could still see it clearly.

As though possessed, she began to scrub off her hands on the white robes, but the blood wouldn't go away.

"No, no, no, no… I had no choice, it was either him or I, either him or I…" Even as a thousand emotions conflicted within her eyes, the army who just witnessed their deputy general get killed in cold blood felt anger rush to their heads as they collapsed on the mentally unstable Wendy.

"Be careful!"

Patriarch Ye roared, but the tens of hundreds of saints had already arrived right in front of the distressed Wendy.

At that moment, her confused eyes looked up at these ugly and bloody faces that lacked every trace of sympathy and warmth, expressions twisted with rage and malice. Faces that abandoned every trace of humanity as they stepped on the corpses of her brothers and sisters so casually it honestly bewildered her.

The teachings of her ancestors and Leonardo's teachings seemed to buzz and clash in her mind. Ultimately, however, she found her body instinctively moving to pick up a sword that dropped to the ground from the deputy general.

Then, a dozen or so attackers came crashing down on her tall and delicate body, blasting it to bits. Just as everyone felt that this was too easy, that Wendy dissolved into strands of multicolored mist.

Then, a colorful crescent moon seemed to bloom and wane, leaving a line of bisected bodies and a faint voice in its wake, a voice that was so soft it brought warmth.

"The first change of the moon," this voice was preceded by a brilliant multicolored strike. Then, tracing back to the origin of the attack's trajectory, they'd witnessed yet another Wendy being struck by a dozen or so attacks only for her phantom to fade into a multicolored mist.

It was the same attack and the same evasive movement technique over and over. However, even as everyone knew what was coming and seemed to expect it, these saints of the first and second cycles were being cut down rapidly and beautifully.

It was all a matter of a few seconds of executions before Patriarch Ye and his peers crashed into the army of the saints to assist Wendy who was fighting with cold tears drenching her distraught expression, her lips constantly trembling while muttering something.

That appearance brought pain to Patriarch Ye's heart, driving him to fight like a beast unleashed, blood vessels turning his eyes red with frustrated fury as though it could mask the pain deep within.

…

"You're quite the hypocrite, you know?"

Far away in a narrow region between the Sky Mountains and the first ring of thunderstorms. Under Leonardo's guidance, he and the High Saint made it back to the location of the spatial tear, only for the High Saint to open his mouth before they could actually start fighting.

"Humans are a tapestry woven from countless threads of emotions. No human is absolutely white while no human is absolutely black. However, no human is only white and black either," Leonardo replied in an ambiguous manner as he took a step forward, his body instantly splitting into twelve lifelike images.

"Whatever makes you feel better about being a cold-blooded asshole, I guess." The High Saint also didn't bother to mince words, his domain exploding as hundreds of cold and sharp swords seemed to tear their way into this space through the void, striking all of Leonardo's images simultaneously.

The High Saint had his hands clasped behind his back while watching coldly. Then, he tilted his head to the side ever so slightly as a crimson blade cut through the air, narrowly missing the space between his brows.

While moving his head, and without even looking at Leonardo's posture, his left hand seemed to grasp the hilt of a random sword before shifting its trajectory to stab right at Leonardo's kidney.

Snorting, Leonardo inverted his open palm to grasp his sword hilt as though he was handling a dagger, stabbing back toward the High Saint's nape with incomprehensible precision.

Clang! Clang! Clang! Clang!

Sparks and metallic clashing echoed, several hundred exchanges in the blink of an eye.

Swords, moons, and dim suns lit up the sky continuously, turning a vast land of mountains and hills upside down, a clearance of dust and stone.

Space kept shaking as the sky wept for the destruction of the earth. However, no matter how fierce their fight was, the high Sky Mountains were as solid as ever, barely budging an inch.

That sight heavily weighed down on the High Saint's heart while he fought off tens and hundreds of Leonardos that filled up his domain.

As for Leonardo, all of his focus was on the sword domain of the High Saint, trying to complement his understanding of the union between sword and energy through this fight.

Hour after hour, even without the presence of the sun and three moons in the sky, both of them knew that a few days had already passed. The quick-paced fight didn't give either party the time to concentrate and unleash any powerful moves. Hence, this was purely a contest of raw sword skills with a few supplementary cultivation techniques.

Leonardo's movement technique and the High Saint's sword intent domain seemed to be in a tight standoff.

Bang!

Another exchange and the two of them separated, landing a few miles apart on two deformed rocky hills.

The High Saint was breathing heavily. "If it weren't for the suppressive nature of this place, you wouldn't have survived this long against my sword."

Leonardo took a deep breath before laughing. "Although I'm a saint, I'm fighting you with the techniques of mortal rank. If I had the type to practice my saint-grade techniques, you would have been dead already."

The High Saint frowned, not knowing if Leonardo was speaking truthfully or not.

"How about I give you the time to train, then we can take this fight to outer space." The High Saint proposed, his eyes shining.

Leonardo was at first stunned before he asked in a not-so-confident tone. "Are you trying to ask my help in leaving this place but in a roundabout manner?"

The High Saint choked, but his expression didn't change. "Can you leave this place?"

Leonardo was silent for a moment. "You fucking hypocrite, you don't even care about the army, you simply want to save your own skin?!"

After a momentary daze, Leonardo added while his expression was somewhat odd, "Do you even care about this war, to begin with?"