Uria had been embroiled in war for countless centuries, The Loom and Noctis Empires had been at each other's throats for hundreds of thousands of years, the motive for the war having been lost into the annals of history and though the public had long forgotten the reasons behind the war, it still raged on.
Of course, with war came consequences of immeasurable magnitude, especially as the inhabitants approached the cultivation limit of Uria. Planet-scale wars such as the one between the Loom and Astralium Empire would throw the atmospheric Lu into disarray. The chaotic Lu that resulted from the disarray would essentially make it poisonous for mortals and even create difficulties for cultivators.
For Uria, the only way to dispose of this chaotic Lu were the Ying Yang Trees. Ying Yang Trees would accelerate the conversion of different types of Lu back into neutral Lu, absorbing their volatile elemental energies and calming the disarray in the atmosphere, thus making them priceless resources across Uria.
Unbeknownst to Valerio, the place he'd chanced upon was not just a sacred ground, it was the lifeline of the planet.
Facing each other in silence, Valerio evaluated the duo standing in front of him to the best of his abilities. Yet his thoughts were cut short by a sudden change in wind pressure targeted directly at his head. Panic overtook Valerio's senses, but thankfully, his reflexes were faster.
Instinctually sidestepping the wind blade, he quickly whipped around, immediately assuming a combative stance.
A silver hue enveloped Ava's hands, she briefly glanced at Eve with a knowing look.
'There was a better way.'
Ava stepped forward whilst Eve dashed to Valerio with a speed that was threefold the speed she had previously been running at, appearing in front of him in a moment.
Valerio willed his Lu towards his hands, a blue sheen emitting from his skin and enveloping his hands. He wasn't a Second Planar yet, he couldn't properly emit Lu outside of his body.
'Fast.'
Eve's attacks filled with fury blurred together as fists, elbows and kicks lashed out at Valerio, creating a tempest that blew away the leaves around her. Her arms continued to accelerate as the wind bent to her will, quickly surpassing Valerio's speed and forcing him into a defensive position.
Valerio's mind whirred to life as he looked for any opportunity to counter-strike and buy himself space while keeping Ava at his periphery.
'Two wind users.'
Valerio's eyes widened as he saw the surrounding Wind Lu coalesce towards Ava and form a wind blade as large as his torso.
He immediately disengaged Eve, a burst of Lu covered his hands as he accelerated and landed a direct hit on her lower abdomen.
Alas, Eve was no ordinary princess, she didn't step back or stop attacking, responding to his puch with a grunt as she spun around, a roundhouse kick flying towards Valerio's head.
Meanwhile, Valerio had no choice but to step backwards and cross his arms in front of his head, aiming to at least protect his head and preserve his life from the wind blade coming his way.
THUMP!
Confusion overcame Valerio as an overhand snapped into his jaw, sending him crashing to the ground. His head rebounded off the earth with a brutal thud—a second blow delivered by Mother Nature herself—that nearly knocked him unconscious.
Without taking much notice, Valerio immediately tried to force himself to get back up, after all, in battle, the slightest slip-up was equivalent to death. But it seemed like his body itself seemed to refuse as he couldn't even orient himself.
'Shit.'
His brain seemed to be protesting about bouncing around inside of his skull so many times by refusing to listen. Yet, Valerio's survival instinct did not disappoint and refused to be taken out merely because 'his brain didn't like ricocheting off of his skull a few too many times'.
With very little conscious awareness of what he was doing, his palms pressed against the ground as if trying to move the planet as he sent himself flying into a backward flip. Though, he wasn't in the clear just yet.
Just because he had shut down the internal protest did not mean the external protest wasn't still present.
Wind Blades continued to fly at him as Valerio was forced to awkwardly dodge midair with a twist of his hip and a shift of his neck. Evidently, he couldn't dodge all of the wind blades mid-air, but he'd happily take ever so slightly adjusting his body to turn a missing head into a cut on the cheek.
Alas, that manoeuvre seemed to have taken the last bit of his immediate focus as he landed on his knees instead of his feet. The centripetal force from the backflip almost knocked the back of his head onto the ground as his body flailed back.
It was then that a speck of clarity returned to him as the lily ad in his soul sea started self-mutilating itself to heal his soul bead that had been tossed around like a ping-pong.
'What the hell was that?'
'How did I get hit with an overhand when I saw a wind blade and a roundhouse kick about to hit me?'
If it had been either of the two, he wouldn't be nearly as pathetic as he was right now.
It was the hit that you didn't see coming that hurt the most.
Ava stopped sending more wind blades as Eve rushed in to close the distance.
Valerio immediately flung his arms up, using the momentum to carry himself from a kneeling position to back on his feet as he blocked Eve's leg kick with a raised knee.
He retreated, there was something amiss.
Eve and Ava were likewise cautious, how was he still conscious?
Both sides tried to assess the situation and gauge the abilities of the other though there was a stark difference between them. Whilst Valerio was panting with heavy breaths, Eve was without a fluctuation in her breathing. Behind Eve, Ava was staring at Valerio with a small gap between her lips, her eyes widened 'How did he dodge that…?'
Though it seemed like Valerio was dishevelled, his mind was anything but, the only thing he was concerned with was the uppercut he'd just been hit with.
He had clearly seen that Eve was mid-roundhouse-kick, there could've been no way she stopped her momentum and had enough time to throw an overhand. And where was the body-sized wind blade he had defended against? His brain went into overdrive, countless different possibilities rushing through his head before landing on the most probabilistic one.
'Illusionist.'
Valerio's eyes widened as the gravity of the situation set in. It wasn't that she had seemingly teleported next to him, the Eve that had been about to kick him hadn't been there whilst the wind blade he had defended against had been nothing more than an illusion.
Thus, when Valeiro was defending against the 'fatal' wind blade, Eve had taken the opportunity to hit him with an overhand he didn't have the slightest clue about.
If they hadn't wanted to knock him out, couldn't they have just stabbed him? He didn't believe they didn't have a weapon on them.
What if that had been a sword and not a fist?
He had almost died.
The realisation came in waves, disbelief, rage and finally, clarity.
A cold shiver ran down Valerio's back as he realised how close he had been to death and was living simply because, for whatever reason, his opponent didn't want him dead.
This feeling internalised within Valerio as he took a sharp exhale to refresh his mind. He had come so close to death so quickly and without having much control over it.
'Mom, dad, the world is truly a large place, isn't it? I'll have to be more prepared in the future,' he internally chuckled as the mere absurdity of it washed over him. He had been making big claims to come and save his family, and now had almost lost his life like this?
It was absurdity.
And it was something that would never happen again.
'Well, if I make it out of here at least.'