Chapter 423 - 423. Losses
The woman felt a piercing shockwave crashing on her mental sphere, she was able to resist the mental attack only after a small crack on the wall of her sea of consciousness was created.
She had also closed her eyes while she resisted the Mental tremor spell, a fuming slash was in front of her when she opened them.
In that fraction of an instant before Noah's attack hit her, the woman let go of every restraint and exploded with her full power.
A phoenix began to form in the trajectory of the slash and she used the hammer in her hands to perform a quick but powerful attack.
Noah's slash cut through the half-formed phoenix, the spell wasn't completed yet so it was destroyed quite easily.
However, the yellow flames that made its body consumed part of the power contained in the attack.
Then, the slash clashed with the hammer, the woman lost her balance due to the Death area around her and was flung away, landing on the ground at a few meters of distance.
The woman left the Death area in that last clash but she wasn't able to savor that moment since she realized that the inscriptions on her weapon had been broken, it was only a normal hammer now.
Also, she felt an external force squeezing her heart, blood flowed out of her mouth as her organ was injured again.
Her situation was quite bad: Her mental sphere had a crack, her heart was slightly injured, and the wound on her shoulder had never fully healed.
She was outside the Death area though, she could use her full power now!
The woman quickly stood up, she stared at the winged man with a venomous gaze as she prepared herself to counterattack.
"I would lay down that broken weapon if I was you."
A voice sounded next to her and she turned only to see a man in the solid stage looking at her with a curious gaze.
Only then did she realize that the battles around her had ended, her mental energy swept the battlefield, the pain coming from the crack on her sphere didn't prevent her from realizing that she was the only soldier of the Empire left alive.
The Chasing Demon sect had killed everyone while she was busy fighting Noah!
Twelve rank 3 cultivators surrounded her, a bitter smile appeared on her face when she understood that no reinforcements had arrived.
"Capture her and bring her to the sect, she might have valuable information. I expect a report with our losses in an hour."
Noah ordered before turning toward the raided building and leaving the battlefield under everyone's gaze.
The rank 2 cultivators directly bowed at his passage, they had watched his battle and felt deep admiration even if they didn't completely understand the difference in the cultivation level between him and the woman.
The cultivators in the third rank were different, they knew that Noah was only in the gaseous stage and they were aware of the difference in power between each stage.
They watched Noah with interest, he didn't defeat the woman but he had been able to keep her busy for a few minutes.
That gave the chance to the other captains to quickly defeat the rank 3 soldiers.
Also, the woman was the strongest of them, using a gaseous stage cultivator to isolate her was an incredible accomplishment.
Many of them had never seen Noah before the events concerning the Demon Prince and were doubtful about his actual power.
However, when they saw that he was able to fight solid stage cultivators while being in the gaseous stage, most of those doubts were solved.
Noah was still weak but it was clear how promising he was!
Meanwhile, Noah quickly walked through the corridors of the raided building, looking for a place where to rest.
The truth was that his cold appearance was only a façade, he felt incredibly tired due to the battle that he had just fought.
After all, he had used the Death area for the entire duration of the battle, Warp, Ghostly claws, Black hole, Dark ray, Mental tremor, Ethereal form, and the partial Demonic form!
All those spells were used while fighting a solid stage cultivator and performing his two rank 4 martial arts, it was obvious that his condition wasn't optimal.
Yet, he didn't want the others to see him in his moments of weakness, he wanted to build the image of a prodigy leading the army of demons, he couldn't appear tired in front of them.
'Even with all my methods, I was still unable to kill her.'
Noah thought as he entered a room and sat on the floor.
There was the corpse of one of the rank 2 soldiers of the Empire in the room but Noah didn't mind it, he just wanted to refill his dantian in peace for the time being.
As for his mental sphere, he chose not to use his many potions, their best usage was when he performed the Divine deduction technique so he would rather let his mental energy refill normally after the battle.
An hour passed quickly and the two cultivators in the solid stage in his team appeared at the entrance of the room where he was cultivating.
They had restrained the woman from the Empire and learnt about her injuries, traces of respect could be seen in their eyes as they stared Noah.
"Speak."
Noah ordered without opening his eyes nor interrupting his cultivation.
"We lost fifteen rank 2 cultivators and a captain is heavily wounded. However, we've managed to retrieve all the resources contained here before they were able to destroy it. Also, all the teleportation matrixes have been destroyed, only those of our sect remain on the island."
One of the solid stage cultivators spoke, Noah couldn't help but shake his head when he heard the report.
'How did they even manage to die? They were two hundred against sixty! Divine Demon was right, the sect has too many useless disciples.'
"What about the other islands?"
"All the other teams have completed their missions and isolated the islands, their losses aren't heavy either."
Noah nodded at that report and gestured for the cultivators to leave.
'Six more days to go, six more solid stage cultivators to face.'
In the solitude of the conquered structure, Noah pondered about his next moves.