The gray-haired girl looked at her surroundings, just Agnes was more than enough to take care down, and though she had a good impression of her, as she gave a licentious bastard a lesson so hard, he actually blocked the memory for the sake of survival, judging by her uninterested expression Agnes wasn’t going to interfere.

Which reinforced her mistaken opinion of Aster being a dual cultivator from a high ranked Stellar System, who came just to look for new partners, that will also explain the high soul cultivation realm she could perceive from him with her spirit sense, despite his seemingly young age.

She gritted her teeth, despite what she said of surrendering she glared at Aster with enough hatred to make anyone scared, specially because her usual behavior is rather aloof and calm.

“You despicable Atria… you killed my father, wounded my mother and you even chased us all the way to this place and you dare to ask what do I want the Diamond Orchid for, of course it is to cure my mother!”, she exclaimed.

Aster raised an eyebrow, not at the affirmation of wanting the Bone Orchid to heal someone, that spirit herb packs a huge amount of vitality and has one of the rarest properties among yang-oriented treasures, it can be used directly by women without the need to be turned into a pill or an elixir.

Which is amazing for those without a trust-worthy alchemist or a strong enough backing to persuade others from trying to steal it once news of it leaks out, Aster was surprised to hear she saying that Tomas was dead.

‘She shouldn’t be older than Camila or Sarina, so she is less than one hundred years old, the old man said he was imprisoned for one hundred years, her mother and the others probably thought he was dead’.

According to Tomas, though the Supreme elder wanted to kill him with all his heart for what he did to his son, he didn’t dare to do so, because the patriarch is alive though in seclusion.

That’s why he was instead crippled with the yang stealing needles and exiled to an obscure place like Rodia, where there weren’t even Star Tribulation level cultivators, the idea was that he aged and died since he couldn’t cultivate in such a low-level place and the needles kept draining his vitality.

But they didn’t take into account the fact that he had a yang body constitution which helped him survive in a weakened state.

Another interesting thing is that Tomas didn’t mention having a daughter, he said he fought for the wrong person and ended up in a bad state because of that, could be he was set up by the gray-haired girl’s mother, but then it doesn’t make sense for her to be wounded to the point that an Immortal grade spirit herb like the Diamond Bone Orchid was needed to heal her.

“What’s your mother’s relation with the Fritz, you hold an important position in the Steel Tower sect, while only being a Mortal Transcending realm?”, asked Aster.

The girl didn’t want to answer, but at this point she has accepted to become a toy if that allowed her mother to escape the claws of the enemies that killed her father.

“I will tell you anything but you have to swear with the heavens as witnesses that you won’t harm my mother”.

Aster shrugged.

“Sure, I swear it”, he casually said, and the usual light of a soul oath surrounded him for a second.

Only then the girl let out a sigh not of relief but of frustration, she avoided her father’s enemies for fifty years, bitterly trained until she passed out and even used the surname of her mother, without raising any waves, she endured having to share the same sect as the one who betrayed her father.

Unfortunately, the patriarch of the sect took the Bone Orchid that she was going to use to cure her mother, and now someone discovered her identity so everything was over.

‘At the very least mother will be fine, uncles will take care of her’, she thought before saying.

“I guess you all didn’t even care who you ruined, whatever I’ll tell you, my mother is the younger sister of the Fritz family’s clan head, Ulises Fritz, in other words she is also the sister of the patriarch of the Steel Tower sect”.

Aster bitterly smiled, judging by the hatred filled tone she put when she talked about the patriarch of the Steel Tower sect, it wasn’t hard to imagine who was the one that set up old Tomas.

“I can’t let you have the Bone Orchid, since I have a use for it”, said Aster which made the girl softly snort, she was prepared to become a slave, and of course that meant she won’t be getting anything, but Aster’s next words made her froze.

“But I can cure your mother, just like I did for your father who is my subordinate now”.

The girl was first baffled, but then she gritted her teeth thinking the guy in front of her wanted to play with her, she clenched her fists so hard that her skin paled, she expected to be humiliated by the scum on the same level as the ones that didn’t let her mother go.

Aster naturally knew she wasn’t going to believe him, he didn’t ask Tomas what happened to him on detail, but judging by the hatred this girl was showing, it wasn’t something simple, at the very least two middle grade Stellar systems and one high grade one was involved.

“Here, see it for yourself”, said Aster as he threw a small crystal case at the gray-haired girl.

She took it and opened it, her pupils contracted on the spot, the content were two black needles, and compared to hers, these were of a better quality, because they are the originals, she didn’t dare to touch them and just glared at them.

Her hands trembled when she inspected the needles, there was a familiar aura coming from them, she hurriedly took out a pendant with a small red crystal, from her spatial ring.

“It’s the same… the aura these needles and the memento of my father that my mother gave me it’s the same”, she mumbled.

Aster nodded, that red crystal contained a drop of blood of Tomas, the aura was the same because those two needles spent a really long time inside Tomas’s body, they devoured his blood and transferred his vitality to the son of the Supreme elder, so it’s natural they give off the same feeling.

When Aster removed them from Tomas’s body, there was a total of six, he placed four into the grandson of the Supreme elder, to make the latter believe, they were still torturing Tomas, there was no way they realized things were off, since it is normal that a “dying” man produce less and less vitality as the time goes, they will only think Tomas is at the verge of death.

Naturally he told Tomas to keep that guy alive, and ordered the latter to keep reporting to his grandfather than everything was fine, a few years out of home is nothing for a cultivator, so in the meantime Tomas will recover and help Aria’s father and the others back at Rodia train.

The face of the son of the Supreme elder will be worth seeing, when he realizes he has been stealing his own son’s vitality, but that is a story for later.

The expression of the girls went through many changes in a matter of seconds, her lower lip trembled, before she turned to see Aster.

“If what you say is true then, let me talk to him once we are out… in the meantime I will help you get the Orchid in exchange, you will have to fight all the others after all, I’m confident in my defense”, she said.

Aster nodded, he wasn’t helping for nothing, according to Aria’s father, the old Tomas was whole heartedly helping the Terranova sect he created, develop, which made sense since the Atria ancestor had prepared him to become the clan head, if not for the Interference of the Supreme elder, Tomas would be on a similar level as Julian, the ruler of a Stellar System, and this girl who can cross realms to fight will be a renowned princess, instead of a mere elder who has to hide her talent.

‘Those idiots sabotaged themselves’, thought Aster.

Considering Tomas even has a yang constitution, the Atria Stellar System would have at least become a middle grade Stellar System, in fact they might have been competing with Tsarai, Zoldia and Galatia to become a high ranked System, since the Fritz which are only a bit behind the top three would be their allies by marriage.

So, both the Atria and the Fritz screwed themselves over, which didn’t make sense, most likely it had something to do with the high ranked Stellar Systems, the Fritz had a backer, and it is possible that the Atria have one too.

Aster shook his head, he can hear the real story from this girl’s mother later, for now he has something more important to do, which is get the Bone Orchid for his cute Empress, and also get the second main node.

“Come then, we have to leave…”, Aster suddenly realized he didn’t know Tomas’s daughter’s name.

Luckily, despite her distant personality, the gray-haired girl wasn’t clueless, she was just rather introvert due to her circumstances.

“My name is Alexandra which means protection, surname is Fritz to honor my mother”, she said.

Aster nodded.

“You can call me Aster, Eris please”.

With Aster’s greenlight Eris activated the yin barrier once again and they were covered by its illusion, disappearing from sight, the Runic Oak which was floating next to Aster then summoned its roots and started advancing in the direction from which the alligator whose corpse was now in Alexandra’s spatial ring, came.

Speaking of Alexandra, she was in awe right now, with a fair reason, she just saw someone deploy an incredibly strong formation in a second.𝒪𝓥𝗅xt.𝗰𝑶𝐌

Though she expected the woman who seemed to be as strong as Agnes, to have some skills this was a bit too much, naturally she didn’t know the formation was prepared beforehand in Eris’s cube necklace, since formations core doesn’t exist in Mortal Planes, or at least not in the four Heavenly Quadrants.

And as if that wasn’t enough, the crystal trees which attacked everyone without distinction were now helping them, it didn’t make sense, but she remained silent, everything that mattered for her was to help the Lord of the Twin Sword valley to accomplish his goal as fast as possible, so that she could get to talk with her father for the first time in her life no to mention cure her mother.

She also saw Aria who was practically stuck to Aster, and heard him flirting with her and she inwardly snorted.

‘That’s why dual cultivators are despicable… I can’t believe miss Agnes who gave that Renard bastard the beating of his life, because he tried to fondle her, is travelling with this guy’, she thought.

Maybe she wasn’t considering Aster an enemy now, but the fact that she mistook Aster for a dual cultivator, which she hated for some reason, remained.

The roots of the Runic Oak transported them through the forest, the more they deepened not only the sky became darker, but the temperature dropped more and more, once they reached a certain point, Aster saw that the crystal trees had started to wither, their crystals had cracks all over them, some had turned black and died, while others were destroyed on purpose by something.

Probably the Void Manipulation spirit beasts, subordinated to the four Law Integration ones, luckily this part was surveilled by the alligator, so after Alexandra killed it, there were no other beasts in the vicinity, so they were able to move without any problem.

But that ended after a few dozens of kilometers, when they reached the territory of another middle stage Void Manipulation spirit beast, this time it was one from the vermin army, a giant Hercules beetle with a black exoskeleton.

“Leave it to me~”, enthusiastically said Agnes, even before Aster could say anything, she had already jumped out of the yin barrier.

The beetle suddenly felt the scythe of the grim reaper approaching it and it exploded in black blue light, its body expanded as it forced its yin radiance to the limit, the increased weight made the ground below explode.

But it was all futile, Agnes who was descending from the sky, just took a draw stance, a halo of orange light appeared behind her, and then she unsheathed the sword which is always hanging from her waist.

The light surrounding her intensified since the blade of her sword was covered on it, she didn’t even finish unsheathing before she returned the sword to its scabbard.

The beetle didn’t manage to scream, or anything, in fact there was no explosion nor shockwave, at least before the beetle’s body divided into halves vertically, both parts were cauterized so there wasn’t blood or anything coming out of the corpse.

The orange light returned to Agnes’s body and she happily returned to the yin barrier, where she looked at Aster with “Praise me” eyes, while she ignored the shock in the eyes of Nerissa, Tiana and Alexandra.

Just like that, she killed a middle stage Void Manipulation realm spirit beast, which focused on defense, they weren’t able to see anything, even Nerissa who already knew Agnes was incredibly strong couldn’t help but be surprised at it.

It’s normal, since besides Vanessa and Aster now, until now, no one else had seen her using her third level sword intent before.

‘Would my shield be able to hold against that’, wondered Alexandra.

“Smug”, mumbled Eris, which made Agnes laugh.

“What, you have your formations I have my sword, let’s not waste time with these small fries”, she said, it was clear that she was in a better mood, Eris has been taking the stage light quite a bit lately after all.

Aster kept the corpse of the beetle in his ring destined for those kinds of materials while the yin accumulation crystal was sent to the mind space, and they then continued.

Far from them, a yellow castle could be seen, unlike the one where the Runic Oak resided, this one had started to lose its luster, and some cracks had appeared on its walls.

A group of twenty spirit beasts were bombarding it from afar, while two small armies of cultivators were destroying the crystal trees in the vicinity.

But that’s not all, there two beasts and three people who outstood from the rest, since they were attacking the castle directly.

“Hiss, put more strength into it, humans, that three will come anytime soon and then you’ll have to fight, the treasure inside can be disputed between you since it is useless for us, but remember the chain link is ours”, said a giant black snake, though its voice was that of a female, it sounded hoarse and it made others feel uncomfortable.

The other largest spirit beast of the group which is a giant falcon used its claws to scratch the walls of the castle, before it shouted.

“If you have time to talk, attack the damn castle too, unless you want to become my meal, bastard snake!”.

“Humph”, the snake snorted and then smacked its tail against the castle, nearly hitting the falcon on the process, it was obvious they hated each other.

As for the cultivators who were participating in the direct attack to the castle, they were the couple of elders from the Pleasure Palace and the elder from the Steel Tower sect.