Chapter 200: The Girls Power [2]
Damon turned his gaze toward Ariel next.
She sat with her back straight and her hands resting on her knees, her breathing slow and even.
A thin layer of moisture clung to her skin, the result of the dense spiritual energy circulating through her meridians.
Her status window appeared.
[Name: Ariel Aquaria]
[Age: 17]
[Cultivation: Earth Spirit Realm - Fourth Level]
[Relationship: Deeply in Love]
[Interest: 4500/5000]
[Chastity: Claim by Damon Arcknight]
[Lust: 0/100]
[Affinities: Water: 80, Spear: 100]
[Spiritual Roots: Sea Spiritual Roots] [Heaven Grade - Low]
[Bloodline: Blood of Sea Princess] [Earth Grade - Low]
[Physique: Body of Sea Princess] [Earth Grade - Low]
[Traits: Sensitive Body, Graceful, Young Lady, Kind, Loyal, Lustful]
Damon nodded.
Three levels in a few days was solid progress, especially for someone her age.
His yang qi was taking effect faster as he now higher in cultivation realm than her as she still working its way through her system, strengthening her foundation with each passing cycle.
He moved his gaze to Mio.
She was seated beside Mia, her ponytail slightly disheveled from the earlier activities.
Her aura pulsed with a steady, rhythmic beat, like a drum being struck at precise intervals.
[Name: Mio Nightrider]
[Age: 23]
[Cultivation: Heavenly Spirit Realm - Second Level]
[Relationship: Deeply in Love]
[Interest: 2150/5000]
[Chastity: Claim by Damon Arcknight]
[Lust: 0/100]
[Affinities: Dark: 100, Bow: 70]
[Spiritual Roots: Void Spiritual Roots] [Heaven Grade - Low]
[Bloodline: Blood of Void Sniper] [Earth Grade - Low]
[Physique: Body of Void Sniper] [Earth Grade - Low]
[Traits: Cheerful, Natural Archer, Loyal, Airhead, Doting Big-Sister]
Heavenly Spirit Realm Second Level.
She had broken through during the cultivation session, just as he had hoped.
The Void Arrow Technique he had given her was clearly synergizing with her bloodline.
He turned to Mia.
She was the hardest to read, even with his eyes.
Her cultivation base was a quiet, contained thing, like a blade hidden in shadow.
[Name: Mia Nightrider]
[Age: 23]
[Cultivation: Heavenly Spirit Realm - Second Level]
[Relationship: Deeply in Love]
[Interest: 1380/5000]
[Chastity: Claim by Damon Arcknight]
[Lust: 0/100]
[Affinities: Dark: 100, Dagger: 70]
[Spiritual Roots: Shadow Spiritual Roots] [Heaven Grade - Low]
[Bloodline: Blood of Shadow Queen] [Earth Grade - Low]
[Physique: Body of Shadow Queen] [Earth Grade - Low]
[Traits: Shy, Natural Assassin, Loyal, Intelligent, Close Pervert, Masochist]
Also at the Heavenly Spirit Realm’s Second Level.
She had broken through at precisely the same moment as her sister, two flames kindled from the same spark, burning at the same steady height.
The twins were perfectly matched, as always.
It was something that had never ceased to quietly unsettle him — the eerie, almost preternatural synchronicity between them, as though the universe itself had decided they were two halves of a single, indivisible thing.
Damon lowered his eyes and thought for a moment.
The Azure Dragon Realm was vast, and there were still three women somewhere inside it.
Alena Terra, the alchemist. Flare, the fire cultivator. And Lumina Solaris, the disguised princess.
He had made a connection with Lumina back in Solaris City.
The Incubus Aura had reached past the careful mask she wore, the composed, untouchable demeanour of a disguised princess, and touched something real buried beneath it.
Something unguarded and genuine, a flicker of warmth she had not intended to reveal. He had felt it in the way her breath had caught, in the brief hesitation before she had schooled her expression back into neutrality.
That moment had been real, and he had filed it away carefully.
But connections like that were delicate things. Left unattended, they cooled and contracted, retreating back behind walls that would only grow thicker for having been briefly breached.
If he waited too long, gave her too much time to talk herself out of what she had felt, that thread between them would fray and snap entirely.
He needed to find her before that happened. And while he was moving, he would find Alena and Flare as well.
Three women scattered across a hostile realm, each valuable in her own way. It would be a waste to leave any of them to chance.
Damon rose smoothly from his seated position, unfolding from his meditation without a sound.
He rolled his shoulders once, feeling the quiet, settled hum of his cultivation after the session, and crossed the cave to where a flat section of stone wall offered a natural surface.
From his storage ring he drew a small piece of parchment and a writing brush, both crisp and clean.
He wrote quickly, each stroke of the brush sharp and deliberate, his handwriting precise without being fussy.
"Gone to scout the realm. Stay here and cultivate. I’ll return before the realm closes.
— Damon"
He placed the note on the bed, where the women would see it when they woke.
Then he turned and walked toward the cave entrance.
Damon moved through it silently, his footsteps barely audible against the stone floor.
He emerged into the open air and found himself standing at the edge of a rocky slope.
He activated his Incubus Celestial Eyes, and the world answered immediately.
The desert transformed. Colours sharpened from dull ochre and grey into vivid, layered hues he could not have perceived a moment before.
Distances compressed, the far horizon pulling closer as though the land itself had folded.
Most striking of all, the spiritual energy woven through the realm became visible.
Water threads shimmered like moonlight on a still pond. Earth threads pulsed slow and deep, the colour of old jade.
He turned his golden gaze across the horizon in a slow, deliberate sweep, reading the patterns the way another man might read a map.
There. To the east.
A faint but unmistakable trace of fire-attributed qi, hot and restless against the cooler, more muted backdrop of the desert’s ambient energy.
It burned with the particular intensity of someone who cultivated fire as their primary affinity.
Flare.
To the north, a gentler pulse.
Earth and nature, intertwined like roots growing through soil.
Alena.
And to the west, a steady, radiant glow.
Light, pure and unwavering, cutting through the haze like a blade.
Lumina.
Damon smiled.