Chapter 164: That strike piercing the wind dragon

Compared to the huge-bodied Tevarin.

Luo De, flapping his Snowy Owl wings, is not much bigger than an ant.

However, just as Luo De flew onto his head, Tevarin's dragon eye, larger than a house, glared at him.

"Is it Barbatos's power that attracted you?"

Luo De clenched his left hand in the void, and a crimson longbow appeared in his hand.

"Roar—"

The pulling force of the wind gathered by Venti on Tevarin was not ordinary; almost the instant he saw Luo De, he flicked his wings, and instantly, cyan light bolts over ten meters in diameter rained down like raindrops.

Under the blessing of wind elemental energy.

These light bolts were extremely fast; in just a breath, they had already landed before Luo De.

Blazing Sun Archery, Falling Moon.

This is Luo De's greatest feeling after truly engaging Tevarin in combat.

This is also the first time Tevarin has felt a genuine threat since he awoke.

Venti, who was borrowing a thousand winds to watch the fight, couldn't help but show a bitter expression.

The battle between Luo De and Tevarin continues.

Falling Moon could easily pierce Tevarin's defenses; one arrow even stabbed into his claw, making him even more frenzied and enraged.

Tevarin's huge body gives his attacks an extremely wide range.

At the moment the bowstring is released.

So Venti could only watch bitterly as Tevarin's hatred toward him deepened.

This is the move Luo De just used.

But this is already enough to let the frenzied Tevarin calm down a bit.

If we don't stop Tevarin now, the City of Mondstadt will surely suffer huge losses and casualties.

That arrow, originally a normal-sized slender elemental-energy arrow, grew larger with distance; by the time it reached Tevarin, it had swollen to over two meters in length.

The inherited archery of the Scarlet King's priestly line also had power far beyond Luo De's expectations.

Really overestimated him.

But the fact is.

But I have no choice but to do so.

Originally in Luo De's understanding.

This arrow.

It slipped through the gaps in the rain of light bolts, flying past at an extremely tricky angle, grazing Tevarin's cheek.

In the high heavens.

A furious roar tore the sky.

In the City of Mondstadt.

The Abyss Mage's deception toward Tevarin was to abandon him and then lead people to hunt him.

In this battle where the sizes are severely disproportionate.

Moreover, no one in Mondstadt can fly as high as Tevarin can reach, let alone drive away the Tevarin ravaging Mondstadt.

Although it was just a graze, a shallow wound still appeared on Tevarin's face.

Luo De's greatest advantage is actually his small size, plus the flexible wind-given power from Venti; with the Hermanubis-powered ritual plus the wind god's wind-given power, Luo De's speed is even much greater than Tevarin's.

This wound is not deep.

Now Luo De brings his own power to fight him, further confirming this; this will undoubtedly deepen Tevarin's hatred toward him and is enough to guide him further into the Abyss.

Luo De is calm and unhurried.

For such attacks.

This Falling Moon move can only harass; it cannot cause major damage.

This makes Luo De, while dodging his elemental-energy attacks, also have to watch out for his physical charge.

It merely scratched the dragon scales, not even drawing a drop of blood.

If a mortal strike imbued with wind god's power can wound him, then he has a chance to suffer heavy injury.

Borrowing the Snowy Owl wings and the ultra-high flexibility from Venti's wind-given power, he weaves through these light bolts, seizes the opportunity, draws his bow, and shoots an arrow.

This is enough for him to dodge most of Tevarin's attacks; when he can't dodge, he has three divine powers on him, plus his self-healing ability, enough to withstand a few hits, and he can still find a chance to counterattack Tevarin.

A giant dragon should be thick-skinned and sturdy, with max physical resistance and immunity to magic attacks.

Tevarin is crazy, not stupid.

"Barbatos!!!"

Good thing I was previously afraid of being slapped to death by this dragon.

"Tevarin's wind-given divine power has already been burned by himself, plus the corrosion of poisonous blood on his body, his life is also rapidly burning; even if the West Wind Knights don't go to subdue him, he will still burn himself out in his rage."

Venti's voice floated on the wind to Luo De's ears.

The meaning of these words.

That is, Tevarin's strength has greatly diminished; aside from this huge dragon body and the advantage of being able to fly, he has completely lost the might of the Eastern Wind Dragon when he fought the evil dragon Dulin back then.

"Does the corrosion of poisonous blood also cause a decrease in bodily strength?"

Luo De, while dodging Tevarin's attacks, continued to ask Venti.

The reply was affirmative.

It's the same principle as those two tear crystals corrupted by Abyssal power repelling elemental energy.

Those who wield a Vision and can manipulate elemental energy, upon touching Abyssal power, will be stimulated into unbearable pain and dare not make direct contact.

Tevarin is a pure-blooded wind elemental giant dragon.

With such a physique, he was destined to be even less able to bear the erosion of Abyssal power.

And such erosion.

His body has endured this for a full five hundred years, and now it is utterly decrepit.

This is also why Luo De can easily wound him.

Otherwise.

If it were Tevarin at his peak, Luo De wouldn't even manage to wound him—he'd likely be killed in an instant at first sight.

At this moment.

Finally, Ying, who had mastered the flying technique, also arrived.

Paimon was not present.

It seems that without external aid, she could never fly up to such a height.

Unlike Luo De, who fought Tevarin with the Blazing Sun Bow, Ying's bladeless sword could not even reach Tevarin, and she also lacked the Snowy Owl Wings, leaving a considerable gap in speed between her and Tevarin.

But the wind elemental power that Venti gave Ying was greater than what he gave Luo De, enough for Ying, who could already manipulate wind elemental power herself, to become an airborne artillery turret.

Gathering the flowing wind into a burst, she shaped it into a shell that could pierce the cloud cover.

Under Venti's command, Ying mastered this technique after just two attempts.

All that could be seen was her unfurling a pair of Wind Wings, floating in the sky, aiming with one hand at Tevarin as azure wind elemental power swiftly gathered, forming a soaring light bolt that shot straight toward Tevarin.

The power of this light bolt was far inferior to Luo De's Lunar Fall; even a direct hit on Tevarin could not break his defenses, merely eliciting a pained roar.

But the wind-elemental-power-made light bolt employed a saturation attack pattern.

The barrage Ying unleashed alone was denser than a volley from the Mondstadt Knights of the Favor below the city walls.

Even ants, if numerous enough, can bite down an elephant.

This saturation firepower's suppressive force is who knows how many times stronger than Luo De's hit-and-run tactic.

「Barbatos!!! 」

Again, it is the power bestowed by Venti, which makes Te Walin fly into a rage, his three pairs of wings flaring as he grits through the pain and charges forward, hoping to finish off Ying, whose attack frequency is unusually high.

Starfall!

Luo De, who was fighting side by side with Ying, immediately unleashed another form of the Flaming Bow Technique.

This time.

He nocked an arrow, drew the bow, and aimed straight at the heavens.

When Te Walin drew nearer, he released the bowstring; an Ice Elemental Power arrow shot straight into the clouds, and as the elemental energy's light faded among the clouds, countless arrows of varying lengths rained down like a curtain, landing exactly on Te Walin's advance path.

For Te Walin, whose body spans several hundred meters, such a needle‑fine attack could only cover the hardest scales on his head.

In terms of pain and damage, these arrow showers were far inferior to Luo De's just‑used Falling Moon, and also inferior to the Wind Elemental Power light bolts shot from Ying's hand; they felt roughly like a mosquito bite.

However, after flying a further distance, Te Walin realized where the problem lay.

From the very start of the battle.

Luo De was using Ice Elemental Power, and this Starfall was no exception.

Thus, Te Walin's initial preparation was to endure the pain and swallow these two humans who had borrowed Barbatos's power to harm themselves.

But he was wrong.

This Starfall is not a high‑damage technique at all; it is a wide‑area control technique.

The needle‑fine arrows that fell on Te Walin's head did not try to pierce his scales; instead, they instantly turned into solid ice, spreading an astonishing chill in all directions, and almost the moment they landed they covered his eyes in a thick layer of ice.

The loss of vision left Te Walin as helpless as a blind man.

The extreme cold brought by the Ice Elemental Power also made the sky‑born Te Walin suffer greatly.

Unable to see ahead and racked with a splitting headache, Te Walin abruptly halted his motion, refraining from a reckless charge; he hovered in mid‑air, waving his claws in an attempt to pry open the ice covering his head.

Seeing the opportunity, Ying immediately increased the barrage of her Wind Elemental Power light bolts.

Caught off guard, Te Walin was instantly struck and howled in pain.

The triple agony of head, body, and spirit made Te Walin writhe in pain in the air, disturbing the elemental energy around Mondstadt to the point of chaos; the turbulence of the elemental currents grew so severe that the connection between some Vision bearers and elemental energy became faint, causing considerable panic.

Just then.

Luo De's second Starfall once again landed precisely on Te Walin's head, making the already bothersome ice grow even thicker.

He had been prying for a while.

The ice layer not only didn't diminish, it became thicker.

Feeling dire, Te Walin decisively gave up struggling; a massive surge of Wind Elemental Power erupted from his body, whipping up a gale that forced everyone's eyes wide open as he spread his wings and soared toward the unreachable heights.

Having finally driven Te Walin away, Ying let out a breath, preparing to say something to Luo De beside her.

But seeing Luo De flap his wings, he shot straight after Te Walin within a dual vortex of icy‑blue and azure elemental energy; at the same time, his body burst with a brilliant green light, and a spear of flame appeared in his hand out of thin air.

This was no ordinary spear.

but a throwing javelin.

Ying, watching from below, saw clearly as Luo De's body, level with Te Walin's, arched like a full moon; his right arm, wielding the spear, instantly bulked up, and after a simple charge, the javelin in his hand turned into a scorching fire dragon, carrying terrifyingly hot Fire Elemental Power, tearing across the sky like a meteor and striking squarely the purple crystal lodged in the middle of Te Walin's second pair of wings.

With a booming crash, it exploded.

The shock made Ying instinctively cover her ears.

The massive purple crystal that had been struck squarely shattered into fragments, some remaining embedded in Te Walin's body, others scattering in all directions.

Amazingly,

These broken crystal shards did not fall; after flying only a short distance, they all floated in the air.

And the fire dragon that had shattered the crystal, its momentum undiminished, pierced straight through Te Walin's body; the intense scent of burning flesh was so strong that even though Ying and Te Walin were far apart, she could still clearly smell it.

The power of this blow was visibly far greater than that of the Falling Moon, and far surpassed all the damage Ying had inflicted on Te Walin since she joined the fight.

Roar——

Te Wa Lin also let out the most mournful sound he had made since appearing today; this sound, rather than being called a roar, is more accurately described as a wail.

It's quite obvious.

He was enduring immense, unbearable pain.

The only good news.

Probably the piercing wound between his wings had already been scorched by the high temperature, with not a drop of blood flowing out; otherwise, if he were to lose a lot of blood from such an injury, he would really be left behind today.

"What a pity."

Luo De, who had continuously used two Holy Rituals and consumed a huge amount of elemental energy, his face slightly pale, looked at Te Wa Lin, who, despite severe injuries, could still escape this place without reduced speed, his voice tinged with a hint of regret.

That strike just now.

It is one of the most powerful attacks in Blazing Yang Martial Arts, unnamed; all the techniques amount to just this one move of throwing a spear.

To maximize the power of this move.

Luo De did not use the Blazing Yang spear; instead, he drew upon his own fire elemental energy to condense a Holy Ritual spear, fully activated the body enhancement of the grass elemental energy Holy Ritual, and used all of his grass elemental energy for power enhancement and elemental energy enhancement.

With all these enhancements stacked on himself, he managed to unleash this strike that severely wounded Te Wa Lin.

Yet even such an attack only shattered half of that chunk of abyssal poison blood, failing to break it completely.

With a hint of regret.

Luo De casually grabbed a purple crystal floating nearby; almost the instant he grasped it, the crystal turned to powder, and all the abyssal power within was completely devoured.

Having replenished himself, Luo De's complexion improved somewhat compared to before.

Immediately after.

These crystals, as if being manipulated by someone, automatically floated over and piled up beside Luo De.

In Ying's dumbstruck expression.

Luo De grabbed handfuls of these crystals, continuously devouring and digesting each scattered crystal without pause.

This was also the first time in a long while that he felt unable to eat anymore.

This forced him to rest a moment, waiting for the abyssal erosion symptoms on his body to disappear before he could resume devouring.

Throughout the process, Luo De did not hide it from Ying, carrying out the operation openly before her.

Only after the abyssal power in the last crystal was completely devoured did Luo De withdraw his hand, satisfied.

At this point his complexion had returned to a healthy flush, showing no sign of weakness from having expended a large amount of elemental energy.

"You"

Ying's mouth twitched slightly, and her gaze at Luo De was like looking at a monster.

Ying knew she could purify Te Wa Lin's poisonous blood.

But compare them.

Luo De's action was essentially the same as directly eating Te Wa Lin's poisonous blood.

This is not merely a conceptual matter.

"It's nothing; everyone has their own little secrets, right?"

Luo De chuckled: "Moreover, if you want to cooperate with me, being completely frank is necessary."

"Eh?"

How come this sounds so familiar, as if I've said it to someone before?

"Cooperation?"

Ying blinked, her eyes widening as she failed to grasp what Luo De meant.

"I have accepted a mission from the Wind God."

"To help Te Wa Lin free himself from the pain of abyssal erosion."

"This isn't easy to handle; I need some help."

It just so happens that you, like me, can ignore the poisonous blood staining Te Wa Lin's body, making you the most suitable to help me.

Luo De spoke half-truthfully.

Anyway, the reasons sound sufficient enough; saying more would risk slipping up, so this is just right.

"Help Te Wa Lin free himself from pain?"

Ying thought for a moment, then solemnly asked: "Te Wa Lin, who is he?"

"Um"

"I haven't told you, have I?"

Luo De stared for a moment, then scratched his head and asked.

"No"

"It's that guy who just got beaten and ran away."

"Huh?"

This time it was Ying who became flustered.

Recalling Luo De's strike that seemed eager to kill Te Wa Lin on the spot, she wondered aloud: "Is the Wind God wanting you to kill him?"

"No, not at all."

Knowing that his recent strike on Te Wa Lin had been misunderstood, Luo De explained: "What we need to do is simply cleanse the poisonous blood from Te Wa Lin's body, um."

Luo De looked left and right; there were no crystals left nearby to use for demonstration.

So he could only gesture with his hands and say: "It's those two purple things on Te Wa Lin's back, you remember? It's that stuff—don't think I just struck him hard, but the poisonous corroding his blood was scattered in a large chunk; his body now is probably much more comfortable than before."

Upon hearing that, Ying understood.

She didn't think too much about it; she only asked one question.

If you promise me, you'll take me to see the Wind God, right?

Yeah, that's for sure.

Alright, I promise you.

(End of chapter)