Alex propped up his sword and got ready to strike. He wanted to kill, he needed to kill. He looked around at the death and destruction. Death was what she deserved.

The Black Venom was defenseless right now, and the thought did cross his mind that he couldn’t kill someone defenseless, but the situation wasn’t what it seemed.

The only reason she was defenseless was that Alex had knocked her out. This was the perfect opportunity.

His sword glowed yellow with a white outline on it, and he rushed forward to kill her.

He went for her neck as that was the only way he had ever known of killing anything, man or animal. The sword made an arc in the air as it fell directly on her defenseless neck.

TWANG!

A rather unfamiliar sound emerged when his sword reached her neck. A white glow appeared around her body as a golden amulet emerged from her chest.

It was well hidden in her clothes, and not easily visible, but when she was in danger, it came out to protect her.

At the same time, the large sound and force woke her up. Her head still hurt from Heaven’s impact, but it wasn’t so bad that she couldn’t handle a mere True Disciple.

Without hesitation, she reached into her storage bag and brought out a mask. Alex’s eyes went wide when he saw that. He remembered the mask from the last time.

It was a mask that blocked all mental attacks. Such a precious mask wasn’t even available in any stores. If one wanted such things, they would either have to get lucky in an auction house or specifically visit a high-grade artifact maker and ask him to make one.

Alex knew that she had multiple such masks, at least she was able to replace one when the first one broke last time. He couldn’t help but wonder how a bandit could ever come across something so good, and so many of them too.

He wondered if she had connections on the outside with people in high places.

“Shit! Not the time to think about that,” he thought to himself and immediately used Heaven’s Impact once more to knock her out.

Unfortunately, he couldn’t match up with the speed of a True Lord realm expert. She had put on her mask as if it was second nature to her, and the spiritual fist dissipated when it hit the mask.

Alex frowned. He was too late.

Without a second thought, he turned invisible and concealed himself. Black Venom looked around, and once again, she couldn’t locate him at all.

The both of them had come to a standstill of a sort.

Alex couldn’t fight her as she was too strong for him, and the only skill of his that worked on her was blocked by her mask.

As for Black Venom, she couldn’t find Alex to kill him like she wanted to, and the only way she could, which was her voice, wouldn’t work on him since it was also blocked by her mask.

Neither of the parties could use their mental attacks on each other, and the match had come to a standstill.

“Come out of hiding, you coward!” Black Venom started to taunt Alex. Her voice sounded like that of a man, very hoarse and deep. “You are a weakling if all you can do is hide. And you dare call yourself a man? If you call yourself one, then fight me like one, you bastard!”

She started shouting curses at him that Alex hadn’t even heard of before. Alex started thinking about what he should do as well.

“If you won’t come out, then I will just do what I came here to do in the first place,” she said and walked over to one of the houses that were still fine.

All the houses in the sect had soundproofing done to them, so even if Alex shouted them to run away, they wouldn’t be able to. The best he could do was knock on their doors and then explain to them what to do when they came out.

That wasn’t an option right now.

His sword glowed goldenly. He arched it over his head from left to right, and the sword left behind 5 phantom images of itself, all glowing golden.

The phantom swords then turned as they faced Black Venom and shot at her.

Black Venom could see the glowing swords, even if she couldn’t see Alex himself. So, when the attack landed on her, all she had to do was use her defensive technique, and not a scratch appeared on her.

Alex was just too weak to do anything to her.

Just then, he saw something golden in front of him as well. He just happened to see Black Venom coat her sickle in golden light as well that she shot towards him.

Alex immediately dodged the attack and jumped to the side. He was surprised that she could see him but later realized that she had just attacked where his attack had launched from and gotten lucky.

“I can’t stand around. I need to keep moving,” he thought.

Black Venom went on to destroy the house, and that was when Alex struck at her once more. This time, it was a golden fist that flew towards her.

The moment he attacked he left the place and watched Black Venom attack where he had been standing before.

His attack was like a child hitting an adult. It barely did anything at all. With the adult fighting back at full strength, the child had no chance of victory.

‘I need help,’ he thought. “Fuck, where did those elders go?”

He spread his spiritual sense to the furthest he could and saw a bunch of elders sleeping on the ground with happy expressions once again.

“Fuck!” he thought. Black Venom had unintentionally affected them as well when she was talking to Alex. He definitely needed some immediate help right now.

He couldn’t leave to wake those elders up as she would destroy the houses and kill the other disciples, so all he could do was call people for help.

Alex’s first choice of contact was his master. He sent his master a message saying that there was an intruder in the sect and that he needed help.

Once he sent the message, he went back to stopping Black Venom. After a few seconds, Alex realized that his master was probably out there fighting someone, so he couldn’t come even if he wanted to.

So, he messaged his second choice of contact, his Senior brother. He sent the same message as his master, but once again, he got no response.

‘Dammit! He must be busy too,’ Alex thought. Alex went back to fighting with Black Venom.

It was less of a fight, and more of an annoyance for Black Venom as an invisible fly kept buzzing around her while she tried to do some work.

After a few moments of conflict, Alex pulled out his communication talisman once again. He had called his Master and his senior brother, but neither were responding.

He decided to call the next strongest person for help. So, he called his senior sister. He sent a short message and immediately put it away, and went back to annoying Black Venom.

“God Dammit! You keep buzzing around. Come out and fight me, you bastard!” she shouted. Alex didn’t respond. He just had to stall as much as he could until help arrived.

He stopped fighting from away and got close. The moment he was close enough to her, he disappeared. He appeared behind her and slashed at her neck once more.

However, a white barrier appeared once more that blocked the attack with a ‘twang’ sound like before.

Black Venom’s eyes went wide when she realized that she could’ve died right now if not for her amulet.

Just as she was thinking that another ‘twang’ sound appeared. She was attacked at her neck once again.

She turned around to look at her assailant and that was when another of the same sound appeared. She was horrified now.

She knew how good her amulet was. It was one of the best artifacts her father had created, but still, it too had a limit of how much damage it could take without reducing in durability.

She couldn’t have it taking so much damage that it became completely useless or worse was destroyed. She couldn’t have it be that, as it was one of the only things her father had left her with when he died.

This was what she used to remember him.

She stopped targeting the houses and flew up. When she did, she realized that the attacks stopped as well.

Alex could no longer teleport around now that she was in the sky.

Black Venom waited for another attack to appear, but it didn’t. She looked around carefully for any disturbances on the ground or in the air, but she noticed nothing.

“What? Are you done? You got scared that you can’t beat me? Then come out and let me kill you!” her hoarse voice rang throughout the sect.

She got no response, so she decided to bait him out. “Very well, if you won’t’ come out, then say goodbye to your fellow disciples,” she shouted and charged up her sickle in yellow light.

As soon as the light peaked in maximum brightness, she attacked. However, at the same time, a sword appeared in front of her and struck her sickle right towards the end of its swing.

The flying slash of the sickle’s path was changed just enough that it struck the empty land at the side of the house and not the house itself.

Alex had managed to save his fellow disciples. However, as a result, he had come right in front of the enemy.