Elder Cultivator

“I found it!” Catarina exclaimed, well within the distance that made it plausible that she could be talking to Anton. Then again, it could also have been nearly anyone among the forces surrounding Yedo.

When he caught her eye and she began to approach, Anton assumed she probably intended to address him. “Congratulations. Where?”

“On the moon!” Catarina gestured to the sky.

That raised further questions, and made Anton think perhaps they were not talking about what he thought. “So you found… what, exactly? I thought you were looking for a solution to… this,” Anton glared towards Yedo. “Unless you somehow returned there without me knowing?” There had been some plans to re-establish the teleportation formations to the moon, but that project was unlikely to have been completed in the middle of the invasion with how much was left.

“The answer! See, it’s all about the flow of the world. We were working on that back in the mountains, it just wasn’t quite right. And I just realized what we were missing.” Catarina took a deep breath. “Can you feel it?”

“There are a great number of things I can feel,” Anton said. “You’d have to narrow it down significantly.”

“The flow. On the moon, Everheart had formations for a lot of things. Right at the end he had tons of them relating to the flow of energy.”

“You mean with those trials? Or whatever they were…” Anton shook his head. “The questions about ascension?”

“They were more than just questions. I didn’t make it all the way to the end because I was inspecting everything, but I have been working with people who did. There was one set strongly attuned to the flow of ascension energy and we thought we knew what it was for. It was kind of like what was at the Chain Harmony Sect.” Anton just waited for her to continue her explanation. “Anyway, it barely worked in the Cragtooth mountains because we had the wrong idea. Now we could make it work better how we planned, but it’s kind of intense, energy-wise. But with what I found I have a solution!”

“I hope you’ve discussed this with the other formation masters,” Anton said.

“They know,” she said. “Speaking of which, we should get started.”

“Great. Just one question. Is this one of those things where you don’t want to say what it does because it might not work or…?”

“Oh, I forgot. It’ll help kick these guys out faster.”

“That’s probably good,” Anton nodded.

“Yeah. We have to get started though. Bye!”

-----

Something was up at the fifty kilometer mark outside of Yedo. Fajra could sense it, though it was well outside of traditional vision. Some of this world’s strongest cultivators were involved, those in Life Transformation, so the activities were notable. It was outside of the feasible attack range for most cultivators, and even Fajra herself would only be able to marginally affect things there on a wide scale.

Those cultivators who had the ability were called upon to make attacks from the safety of the walls. It didn’t matter what it was, any sort of formation made by the enemy was not allowed to be completed. Unfortunately the formation masters themselves were defended by the strongest members of the enemy army, and resisting attacks that were strained to their limits was something they could keep up longer than those from the upper realms.

Soon enough, attacks on the cultivators were given up- though they didn’t leave any completed sections as they were. It was unfortunately the case that the materials used in constructing the formation were quite durable and resistant to attacks with ascension energy. More concerningly, even without being complete something about the formation seemed to deflect their attacks.

Given the limited numbers of cultivators suited for such a situation, they realized their efforts would not be sufficient. Perhaps they should move out in force to destroy the work, but there were some mitigating factors.

First was that it could simply be a trick. Simple formations that looked to be part of something larger and more important precisely to draw them out. Nobody wanted to lead such an effort, and outside of their own defenses the battle would be far too… fair. Was the risk worthwhile? The second factor indicated it was not.

The distance required to make even a simple ring was several hundred kilometers of work. At the rate that was being done, they would not accomplish their work before the point at which the tides would change. That meant unless progress accelerated, they could simply leave before anything was finished. Upon advice from the formation masters among them, they waited and watched.

Sending someone out stealthily didn’t work either. There was always someone watching, and not just watching but annoyingly able to target anything within the entire area. Two snipers, clearly making use of the same techniques. They were key targets to take out if the opportunity arose, but they never got far from the majority of the army. They simply continued to rain arrows down on them day and night without a moment of peace. It was so annoying, as she had to lower her own sensing ability to get any rest, or be constantly woken up by pins pricking in her mind.

At least it wouldn’t be a problem to maintain the formation. They had plenty of energy to spare for that. At the current rate of damage nobody would even die. Not that it would ultimately make a difference. There was only one possible result for those who resisted people from the upper realms, and this city had been quite a pain to conquer. The rest of those involved… well, perhaps they wouldn’t immediately have retribution visited upon them, but things weren’t going to go well for them either. Not if Fajra had anything to say about it, and she would. Along with everyone who lost their disciples.

Days passed, turning into weeks. The formation was perhaps a quarter done, sections of it randomly splayed out around the city at great distance. It was nowhere near complete, and it was nearly time. Soon they would be ready to return. The plans to dismantle the city were already in place, but it needed to remain as it was until the time came.

And then it happened early, and all at once. Fajra was the most sensitive to the tides as the strongest among them, and had been responsible for protecting a large group as they descended. All it really required was following the flow of the tides, and while the reverse was somewhat more energy intensive most of the effort wouldn’t be on her own part. So when she found her feet lifted off the floor, Fajra was surprised.

No, it couldn’t be. It was too early. This wasn’t the start of the flow, but the final tide. Yet she couldn’t deny it either. Fajra might have been able to remain in place if she was willing to let her upper energy be ripped from her body, but there was no way that was happening. Thus, she crashed into the roof and then through it. Around her she saw the effects had come into place on the strongest first, such as the Integration cultivators.

She wasn’t sure quite what was going on, but Fajra was not happy. She gathered a burst of upper energy to at least destroy something on her way out, but as she thrust it towards the ground it merely rebounded towards her, shoving her further away. Results like that weren’t something she was willing to test further, and then there was the issue of the others. She was being pulled ahead, and while Fajra would most certainly be fine many would not be able to breathe if they were separated from her. She wasn’t responsible for all of the fools who died elsewhere, but she at least had to care for the disciples of the Radiant Beauty Sect.

She stretched out her energy, wrapping it around them. Most of those present were smart enough to go outside to look at what was going on, and though her energy couldn’t quite reach them they stretched out towards her and attached themselves. She pulled them closer, and they began to move into the sky.

-----

The shifting of the flow of the world had indeed been happening gradually for a while, but when it finally flipped Anton felt the force of that change. The ascension energy in the area suddenly and violently was forced upwards away from the world, and Anton could tell it wasn’t welcome. He could sense whatever connection he had to it was cut off for the moment, as the current turmoil disrupted even his irregular connection to that source of energy.

When he saw people flying up into the air he almost didn’t even think to shoot them. But as they pulled away from the defensive formations of Yedo, he started to shoot. Even if they were intentionally expelling these people from the world, he could try to take some of them out. With all of those present surrounded by bubbles of energy from the Ascension cultivators, Anton focused on disrupting the energy as much as possible. He’d done the same with the one who had tried to fly and knocked him out of the air, but unfortunately this time the results weren’t as good. His attacks battered against superior quantities of energy, and even if he disrupted them momentarily it wasn’t enough to pierce attacks through to those inside.

A few moments later Kseniya followed up with the same, having woken up at the feeling of significant changes. There had been no real warning of the timing of this event, and the formation masters were also scrabbling to augment the formation with temporary flags.

The formation masters weren’t actually working against Anton, but as the mass of people accelerated further into the sky he wished they’d left things so he could take several more shots. He was fortunate, however, to snag a few stragglers. For whatever reason they were not in the air at the same time as the others, and some broke out of the formation before being protected.

The invaders were being thrust away into the sky faster and faster, rising kilometers in a short time. At tens of kilometers they were still something he could target, and Anton found a peculiar phenomenon that the higher his arrows went the better they traveled, up to a point.

Directly fighting against gravity was one difficulty, while another was simply distance from himself. As he flew along with his arrows he felt the air thinning, no longer getting in his way- but additional sources of energy disrupted his attacks- along with the massive flow of ascension energy that was going into the sky.

Then the invaders were out of range, more than a hundred kilometers in the sky and riding the flow of the world’s energy. A few minutes later and he couldn’t feel any individuals, then he lost track of individual groups as a similar phenomenon happened slightly slower in other parts of Estary. Then… they were gone. No invaders left behind, and Yedo empty.

Well, not truly empty. There were still people in there. Locals. It was hard to tell how many with the defensive formations. That was the next target then, and Anton’s personal disappointment that the enemy got away would have to be dealt with later.

He began to charge up a shot, and Elder Sarka was eagerly charging forward as well. But the formation masters called for them to stop.

“You’ll damage the formations! This might be our one chance to study them perfectly intact and dismantle them!” Catarina was the most vocal. “Plus, it’s energy that could be used more efficiently for something else.”

Sarka snorted, the huge wave of fire she had prepared being shot directly into the sky. “Fine. But don’t take too long. We have to make sure there aren’t more in there somewhere. I’m going to go check on the other cities just in case.”