Cultivation Nerd (xianxia)
Chapter 282 – Sibling Clash

Song Song marched toward the inner sect with the kind of certainty that made hesitation feel foolish. Like her steps carved a path, the world had no choice but to follow.

“Do you even know where you need to go?” I asked since I myself wasn’t entirely sure where Song San was staying.

Song Song remained quiet, her pace never slowing. Just as we neared the inner sect’s entrance, she turned her head toward me.

“What about you? Do you know where we need to go?” she asked.

“No,” I admitted. “Song San has a technique that hides his presence.”

“Then, if you don’t know anything, you should just shut up and follow orders,” she said flatly.

Oh?

That had hit her harder than expected. Her tone wasn’t like her usual teasing sarcasm; it was colder and sharper. She was angrier than she let on, and I had no intention of finding out just how angry.

“Hunt for me, my demon’s bloodhound,” Song Song hummed.

She pulled a curved dagger from her storage ring, its blade glinting with a crimson hue as though it had already tasted blood. Without hesitation, she dragged the edge across her palm.

Blood welled up, thicker than usual, and almost syrup-like dripped to the ground.

But it didn’t just splatter.

It pulsed.

Each droplet twitched like a startled insect, tendrils unfurling and slithering into one another with blood weaving itself into something. The pool twisted and bubbled like it was boiling from within until, snap, a blood-drenched jaw burst from its center.

Next came bones or at least something resembling them. A ribcage of blood, paws formed from congealed muscle strands, and glowing red eyes that opened without lids. The creature let out a low growl, the kind that vibrated more in your chest than in your ears and rose to its feet.

A hound-like construct, half-liquid and half-solid, its form shifted with every movement, never fully settled.

“Find all the creatures in here related to me by blood,” she commanded.

Without pause, the hound dashed off at incredible speed, and we followed close behind. I stayed a step behind Song Song and let her lead the hunt.

“So, is that a Foundation Technique or an Earth Grade one?” I asked.

“Foundation,” she replied.

I rubbed my chin, mentally reviewing everything she’d shown me so far. It seemed that her ultimate path involved something akin to a blood demon master, less about conventional martial paths and more about becoming a conceptual force.

She was heading toward a concept breakthrough.

Meanwhile, I was building toward a technique breakthrough. Collecting, refining, and weaving techniques centered on the mind. Eventually, I’d fuse them together into something that could help me perceive the world in ways no one else could.

Her foundation was surprisingly solid, especially for how little time she'd spent cultivating to reach this stage. That likely meant she'd consumed a heavenly treasure, something potent enough to eliminate the usual drawbacks of a rushed breakthrough.

The only treasure I could think of that matched that description was the Nine-Hearted Blood Fruit. A rare resource born from a tree that grew on battlefields where demons had died. What that actually meant… I wasn't sure. But it sounded ominous enough. It also aligned with her element.

Still, it wouldn't surprise me if her father had something like that lying around. Song Song was his magnum opus, after all. There was a good chance she was likely the final vessel he would ever need to possess. Spending a treasure of that caliber on her was logical and necessary if he had such plans.

By now, it was also clear: there were steep conditions for taking over someone's body. Conditions even the Blood Step Immortal couldn't override. Otherwise, he would have taken Song Song by now.

In any case, if she was pursuing a Blood Demon Master concept for her ultimate technique, then she was moving in a direction that made sense. Blood wasn’t something you refined like metal or studied like arrays. It was only scary as a concept, not in actuality. 

A concept of domination and control. Her aura already reflected that.

Come to think of it, my Eight Mind Phantoms Technique would fit her perfectly. 

Unfortunately for her, I wasn't going to share it.

It was one of my only true defenses against mental attacks, and I liked keeping at least one card close to the chest.

As we continued following her blood hound, we approached a part of the Sect that made my chest tighten. The land here was scorched, charred black and blanketed in patches of stubborn snow. Judging by how the hound tracked its targets, it must've found someone closely related to her by blood.

That narrowed it down.

Her siblings? Most were dead.

Her father? He was probably too skilled to be caught by something like this. 

However, judging by the location, we were near the place where Song Song and I used to live. Her frown deepened. She'd noticed it too. Though the mansion was no longer here.

The blood hound sniffed the air, circling a scorched patch of ground until a hatch opened. From it emerged a man wearing a porcelain mask, holding a weathered book in his hands.

I recognized that book instantly. It was the memoir of Song Song's mother, filled with alchemic notes and scattered thoughts. Nothing groundbreaking, more sentimental than practical.

Not that Song Song ever cared about it.

"My mother often pitied yours," the masked man said, his voice calm, almost wistful. "Your mother suffered a damnable fate too."

I didn't know why he said that. Maybe he was trying to connect with her, some kind of familial sympathy about the lives their mothers had lived.

But if that was the play, he picked the wrong sister.

Blood spilled from Song Song's palm, the same wound she'd opened minutes ago, and writhed in the air as if alive. It thickened, coiled, and gathered above her like a storm cloud of red.

Then, it shifted.

The liquid hardened into a massive battle axe, its crimson blade gleaming in the light, its haft long and heavy, meant to be wielded with both hands. The weapon pulsed like it shared a heartbeat with its owner.

Then she moved.

No warning. No blur. Just absence and the deep cracking sound of earth breaking beneath my feet.

One moment she was standing beside me, that impossible weapon raised high–

And the next?

Gone.

Only the ground betrayed what had happened.

A deep, splintering crack spread outward in a spiderweb pattern from where she’d launched as if the earth itself had recoiled from the sheer violence of her movement.

By the time my senses caught up, she was already in mid-air above the masked cultivator with her enormous, blood-forged axe raised overhead. The weapon now radiated with an even more feral intensity, its surface writhing as if something inside it lived and screamed.

The blood hound she’d summoned earlier had dissolved into a thick stream of crimson, wrapping around the axe and fusing with it.

Then she brought it down.

The air screamed.

The masked cultivator barely had time to react. He crossed his arms to block, a shimmer of desperate protective Qi forming around him like brittle glass.

But it didn’t matter.

The axe didn’t meet resistance.

It cleaved through his defense and his body alike, slicing him clean from crown to ground in a geyser of light and mist.

Only, it wasn’t blood that spilled.

It was green. Formless. Like smoke that had forgotten how to perish.

His body disintegrated the moment it was torn apart, turning into that strange green mist racing toward her.

But Song Song moved with terrifying precision, swinging her axe in a wide arc. The mist shredded, dissipating like fog struck by the wind.

Then, the earth next to her bulged.

Cracks spiderwebbed outward again as the soil split. A pale, scarred hand clawed free from below, followed by the rest of the masked cultivator’s body. He emerged like a serpent shedding its skin, dragging himself from the ground.

He didn’t run and just stood there.

Then, with deliberate calm, he reached up and tore the porcelain mask from his face, letting it fall with a hollow clack onto the frost-covered ground.

What lay beneath was far worse than anything the mask could’ve hidden.

His face was a grotesque ruin of melted flesh fused into a warped, unrecognizable horror. Scars twisted across his cheeks like gnarled roots, and where a nose should’ve been, there was only a collapsed crater of skin.

His mouth stretched wide into something that only vaguely resembled a grin. But too crooked, too wide, and wrong.

The only thing that remained normal-looking was his green eyes.

But even they began to change.

The irises narrowed into vertical, reptilian slits glowing with unnatural green light. His thick, tangled green hair began to move, each strand twisting, slithering, hissing.

Dozens of tendrils curled and snapped around his head, fanged mouths at their tips gnashing air.

It was a Medusa-like horror, not made of snakes but of animated, cursed-looking hair.

A forked tongue flicked from between his charred lips as he tasted the air.

The Qi around him shivered and turned noxious, as a rotting sensation and pulsed like a heartbeat, the pressure rising as though the very earth beneath their feet was preparing to suffocate everyone else.

I immediately formed an air-locked jade barrier around myself, just in case there was some airborne poison.

This was likely some kind of Foundation Technique designed to transform him into a serpent-like creature.

But what happened next was even more shocking.

One moment, he stood there, all scary-looking. The next? He vanished. No blur. No flash. Just… gone.

Song Song’s eyes widened, instincts flaring a heartbeat too late.

A sickening thud echoed through the battlefield as Song San's fist slammed into her stomach. The impact was sharp and final, like stone shattering glass. Her body folded around the blow and then flew backward and launched like a meteor tearing through the sky.

She hit the ground with a deafening crash that echoed across the mountains.

Dirt, snow, and stone exploded outward in a violent arc as she carved a trench through the earth, finally smashing into the mountainside with enough force to crack it open.

The impact shook the ground. A deep crater split along the slope like the world had taken a punch from a god. I had to leap back just to stay outside the radius of the shockwave. Dust and debris blasted past me in a storm of sound and pressure.

She didn’t get up immediately.

I tensed as I saw movement in the dust.

Song Song stepped from the crater, brushing dirt from her clothes. Not a scratch on her.

She didn’t even look angry. Just… annoyed.

Her eyes locked on her brother like nothing had happened.

I let out a breath I hadn’t realized I was holding.

“You’re fast,” Song Song said, her voice dry. “But your attacks are kinda shitty. I know a Foundation Establishment guy whose punches hurt more than yours.”

“That’s quite a mean thing to say, sister,” he replied. “What if you hurt my feelings?”

His form shifted again, the monstrous presence falling away. His hair and features returned to their previous state, more human, but still looking scary as hell with those burn scars.

It seemed he’d realized brute force wasn’t going to cut it against Song Song.

But that moment of stillness shattered like glass.

Without warning, monstrous Qi surged from both of them. It was an eruption so vast it cracked the earth beneath me.

This wasn’t just power.

It was two wills colliding without restraint.

This was intent intertwined in their Qi. Especially Song Song who released her killing intent, and even though I wasn't the target, I felt like sufficating. 

It was the same suffocating pressure I’d felt when Song Song had nearly used her ultimate technique on me… but this time, she wasn’t holding back.

And neither was he.

Their auras rose to their peak, distorting the very air. Stones cracked. The snow evaporated around them. Even the clouds above seemed to shudder, recoiling from the clash.

The mountain groaned under the weight of the killing intent.

They were about to unleash everything.

The moment I realized that I didn’t hesitate.

I started preparing to get the hell out of there.

A dense, unnatural purple mist began to swirl around Song San, rising like smoke from a cursed pyre. It clung to him, tighter with every breath, wrapping around his body like it was alive.

His twisted grin stretched wider across his ruined face. And then it deepened into something far more nightmarish.

Across from him, Song Song stood still as a statue. Her eyes held no emotion, no fear, just cold and focused clarity. Crimson light bled from her skin, not glowing but shifting and warping into thick rivers of blood that hovered unnaturally in the air around her.

They looked like two monsters awakening, and I had no intention of being caught between them.

A chilling stillness fell over the mountain.

From Song San’s side, the purple mist surged like a tidal wave, condensing into a monstrous serpent. No, nine serpents. Each head was twice the size of a grown man. A hydra made of poison mist sizzled through the air. The serpent reared back, its sinuous body coiling upward until it loomed over the entire peak, casting a vast shadow over the land below. Its nine heads hissed in unison, a sound that vibrated in the bones.

On the other side stood Song Song, having also unleashed her ultimate technique.

Crimson armor clung to her like a second skin, shifting and pulsing as if alive, crafted from living blood. The war axe in her hand glowed with lethal intent, massive beyond normal use, yet she wielded it with effortless grace. Her wings, bat-like and dripping with blood, spread wide behind her, blotting out the pale light. Atop her head rested a helm, twisted into the shape of a crimson crown with horns curved like blades.

She glanced my way and looked like she was about to act. But then, another presence appeared beside me.

“You two youngsters can continue your fight. I will just make sure you don’t destroy the Blazing Sun Sect during your clash,” came an elderly voice.

Cai Hu, the Sect’s Level 7 Array Conjurer, appeared behind me, stroking his well-trimmed white beard with a weary sigh.

“I swear, youngsters these days…” he muttered. Then he raised his hand, and a massive translucent white barrier formed around the combatants.

Inside the barrier, Song Song kept her gaze fixed on me, her expression unreadable. Like she was just waiting for something before making her move.

“You should concentrate on the battle, sister!” Song San’s voice boomed from the core of the nine-headed serpent, echoing across the mountainside like rolling thunder.

His physical form was nearly gone now, dissolving into a writhing haze of violet mist at the serpent’s heart. His figure flickered in and out of view, half-man, half-manifestation. His eyes glowed from within the core, slit and serpentine, his voice laced with a venomous resonance that crawled under the skin.

The mist that composed his body hissed and spat like acid, corroding the very air. It had become one with the serpent as though he was the serpent.

Song Song didn’t answer immediately.

The axe in her hand pulsed with a slow, heavy rhythm. Blood dripped from her armor, steaming as it hit the ground. Even the earth couldn’t withstand her battle aura.

“You think too highly of yourself, brother,” she said at last. Her eyes left me and locked onto the monstrous hydra, sharp and unfazed.

In the blink of an eye, she vanished.

A deafening crash followed like a mountain splitting open. Crimson and violet Qi exploded across the battlefield in a wild storm.

When the smoke cleared, the towering, nine-headed serpent was gone. All that remained was the shattered mist dispersing in the wind.

Song San’s body lay crumpled on the ground. Blood pooled beneath him. A single, massive gash cut from his left shoulder to his right hip. It was a very deep cut, and I could see some of his ribs and twitching organs. His breath came in short, broken gasps. His body jerked, unwilling to accept what had happened.

Song Song stood above him.

Her axe still dripped blood. Her armor gleamed in the dying light. Her expression remained unchanged. No pride. No triumph.

Only cold inevitability.

She looked less like a victor and more like an executioner.

Song San struggled to raise his head, but his body refused. All he could do was stare at her shadow stretching across him, growing longer as the sun dipped low behind her.

“I don’t need to try that hard to defeat you,” she said coldly.

Her voice echoed with finality.

She spun the war axe once, the blade catching the last rays of sunlight, gleaming like a falling star ready to strike.

She raised it, preparing to end it.

But then–

Her body shuddered. Just slightly.

Dark blood trailed from the corners of her eyes.

Then her nose.

Then her lips.

It was thick. Tar-like. Unnatural.

Her fingers loosened. The war axe wavered.

“What?” she whispered, her voice faint.

Her now-crimson eyes widened in disbelief as she stared at her trembling hands.

Her whole body froze. Armor stiff. Wings twitching in small, erratic spasms.

Something was very wrong.

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