Mystical Journey

"They’ve started fighting!" Joseph said,"Su Lin, those two freaks are fighting!"

"One of them is my friend...," Su Lin corrected him,"could you please not call him a freak?"

"Oh...I’m sorry, I was too excited."

The two of them could see Duskdune Shura leading with Garen in the chase as they dashed into the formation of the Werewolves. Like two bulldozers, where they hit the formation, Werewolves were sent flying. Even someone far far away could hear the sunken footsteps.

Very quickly, they disappeared into the shadows.

Soon, a small group of people emerged from the tomb entrance. First off it was the three strangers who had just entered, then there was the bearded man and Beo, everyone in this group looked like a pile of mess.

Upon seeing what had transpired outside the entrance, the group quickly ran to stand with Celine, in anticipation of an attack from the Werewolves.

What was interesting however, was that only a few Werewolves attacked them, while the majority instead were headed towards Flamingo.

At this moment, Flamingo was attracting everyone’s attention.

He seemed to be chanting something, and as he did, he would stroke his sword ever so softly, and wherever his fingers touched the sword, it would glow in red. In total, nine runes started glowing bright, lava red.

*************************************

Bang!!

Garen and Duskdune Shura’s arms hit each others, some bits of loose cloth was sent flying.

The both of their arms kept colliding, as the fought furiously, letting out sounds like thunder each time their arms collided. As they fought like a hurricane, they slowly pushed their way out of the Werewolves’ formation as well.

"You cannot kill me," Duskdune Shura suddenly produced a hand knife technique with his right hand, which was blocked just in time by Garen.

"How can you be so sure if you don’t let me try?" Garen smiled.

Pow!!

The both them retreated away from each other, creating a small distance between them.

"First Dan!"

Garen put his foot down, and the ground shook violently, his body suddenly expanded. He gestured his right hand into a hand knife and went straight towards Duskdune Shura.

Bang!!

His hand knife hit a tree instead, littering wood shavings all over the floor. The tree shook slightly, and the top of it started slanting by a bit.

Duskdune Shura had evaded his attack by moving to the side, his face was hit by one of the bigger splinters, and it was obvious he was hurting a little from it. This made his expression change.

"Increase in speed seems to have also increase your strength. If that’s the case..."

He too put his down onto the floor, drawing a weird curve shape with it, he was neither quick nor slow, but just fast enough to evade Garen’s second hand knife attack.

He turned around, and revealed his right palm, which by now had some sort of a black mark on it in the shape of a V, like someone had painted it on with ink.

"The first Dragon’s Gate!"

Bang!

Garen’s face dropped, he thought he had evaded it.

He was certain he had seen himself evade it early, but still somehow he got struck. He felt a his right waist going numb, just like the time he first got hit by a palm technique.

"Fuck!" Garen didn’t want to believe in this witchcraft, so he returned with another palm,"I refuse to believe you hit me!"

Since he couldn’t evade it anyways, he decided to repay pain with pain, and released his fury onto Duskdune Shura.

However, he only managed to hit the seems of his clothes.

"Second Dragon’s Gate!"

Again it came, when he heard Duskdune Shura’s voice, Garen hastily retreated.

"Serial Swing Form!"

Both of his palms rapidly drew up a circle.

However, once more, Garen saw his Serial Swing Form hit nothing but air!

Just as he was about thit Duskdune Shura’s arm, his opponent suddenly twirled downwards, and sneakily evaded the collision, then lightly slapped Garen’s stomach.

Pow !!

"What is happening?!" His pupils dilated, he could only feel numbness in his waist and nothing else, his internal energies were also starting to get messed up.

"Third Dragon’s Gate!" Duskdune Shura announced, with a quick turn of his feet, he was suddenly behind Garen, with his back against him, he hit Garen’s tailbone with his right palm.

"Second Dan! Rush Form!"

Garen scrunched up his face, his body expanded even more now as it started turning into a sinister green and black colour. He rushed forward with his shoulders, aiming directly for his opponent’s chest.

But that weird, sinister feeling from earlier came back once more. Duskdune Shura evaded Garen’s attack with a simple turn of his feet, and hit Garen in his tailbone again.

Bang!

Garen staggered forward a few steps, where his foot had stepped on, he raise grass and wood shavings into the air, creating an opportunity for him to pull his distance away from his opponent.

The two of them now once again stood facing each other in the same distance as before.

"Final Hit!" Duskdune Shura rushed towards Garen, his body now turned into a black shadow, his arms were like electric from an eel, the speed much much faster than the previous three hits.

"Bring it on!!" Garen bellowed, sounds of a python hissing suddenly started appearing around him, he tried to block with both of his arms.

But they were no good, the opponent’s palms easily slipped past his Red Jade Palm’s protection, and made their way towards Garen’s chest.

"Double Shots Form!"

At this moment, Garen focused himself, both of his palms shot out like lightning and went straight for Duskdune Shura’s chest. The breeze around them shifted from a soft blow to a loud tear in the sky.

Since he couldn’t evade it anyways, might as well stop trying to evade and just return pain with pain.

"It’s useless," Duskdune Shura, barely flinched, and continued forward.

Bang!

Duskdune Shura somehow evaded Garen’s attack again, he now landed both his palms on Garen’s chest. As the force and shockwave settled into Garen’s chest, he paused for a moment, then he was sent flying backwards.

Sensing the response from his palms, it wasn’t enough! Duskdune Shura focused his sights on Garen.

Without a moment of hesitation, Duskdune Shura jumped up in a split second and was suddenly flying in parallel with Garen’s backwards flying body!

"Go back down onto the ground!"

His gestured to elbow Garen with his left hand, as it expanded and turned black, like a concrete pillar it hit Garen in the abdomen.

Boom!

Garen was sent straight to the ground, forming a crater around where he landed.

"The Fifth Dragon’s Gate! It is finished." Duskdune Shura lifted his right palm.

Garen was not done.

[I refuse to believe I can’t hit you!]

"Red Jade Palm!"

Bang !

The pine forest was filled with the sound of strong winds rushing through them, in between the leaves rustling and trees moving, there were still the occasional tweet from a bird or two.

Everything seem to have sunk into silence in a sudden, leaves from the pine trees fell like rain.

Meanwhile in the crater.

Garen and Duskdune Shura’s right palms met each other, but neither were moving.

Suddenly, both of their bodies started shaking violently, the vibrations were being sent back and forth each other’s bodies, this was a highly advanced technique of defensive vibration only mastered by the greatest warriors.

Duskdune Shura’s face paled, he suddenly took three steps backwards.

Bang, bang bang, each step he made left obvious footprints in the ground.

The edge of his lips opened slightly to let out a small streak of blood.

"Fuck me...."

Garen slowly got up, his face now forming a sly smile.

"How is this possible?!" Duskdune Shura’s eye opened wide in disbelief. "How could you... how could you still move?!"

After being hit by his first four out of seven Dragon Gates, no matter how strong one’s Body Hardening was, it would still require at least ten plus minutes to get up, let alone move like this! He simply couldn’t comprehend what was transpiring before his eyes.

"It’s quite disappointing," Garen moved his body like nothing had hit him,"in reality you only managed to seal two of your palms. My second Dan can manipulate all of my inner energies, creating a high speed metabolism to tackle arteries that are sealed. Plus a little bit of assistance from some blood boiling. Not to mention, you didn’t use enough energy..."

Garen pulled the remaining cloth on his upper body with one hand, revealing his statuelike muscular upper body.

With his long purple hair casually draped over the shoulder of his muscular body, Garen’s both eyes suddenly glowed a bright red.

"This......is the real ‘finishing’"

Bang!

Before his last word dropped, Garen made a strong stomp on the crater, and dashed towards Dushdune Shura in a split second.

The both of them collided into each other, their arms exchanging attacks, releasing loud bangs over and over again.

Duskdune Shura was visibly moving backwards, as he tried hard to defend against Garen’s endless attacks.

Ka Cha!

One of the pine trees was chopped by Garen’s hand knife, like a thin bamboo tree’s stem being sliced, it fell onto the next pine tree.

The both of them fought while moving about the pine tree forest, as they moved further and deeper into the forest.

"Red Jade!"

Garen’s two palms suddenly glowed red, and moved in parallel towards Duskdune Shura.

With a loud bang, Duskdune Shura’s both arms tried to block the attack but he was still pushed back for ten plus steps. By the end of those ten steps, he spat out some blood.

With his back against a nearby pine tree, Duskdune Shura could only feel a strong burning sensation from the parts of his arms where he had used to block Garen’s attacks. As he lifted them up close to inspect, he noticed that they had started to form blisters like they had been burned by fire.

"This is...Firestream Fist??!! You...you...were able to master hardening techniques and still perfect this level of Second Secret Techniques!!??" Duskdune Shura’s face was filled with disbelief.

Garen smiled a little.

"You were actually able to recognise it," since the opponent had mistook his Red Jade Palm for Firestream Fist, he decided to play along. It was true that Red Jade Palm had absorbed the attributes of Firestream Fist and Dark Iron Palm, in fact it was an enhanced version of both.

"Again!"

"Red Jade, Single Shot Form!"

Garen dashed forward, his right palm extended.

His entire right palm glowed red, releasing a great amount of heat, like iron burned to red, it aimed straight for his opponent’s chest.

"Dragon Overturns Ocean Technique!!" Duskdune Shura yelled at the top of his voice, his face flashed a bright red, obviously showing he had used some sort of secret technique to trigger a hidden ability.

A low rumble started ringing in Garen’s head, as if a massive masculine lion had appeared in front of him and was about to prance on him.

"Bravery Repression technique? I know that too!" Garen scoffed, suddenly a strong aura of courage appeared around him, the formless energy concentrated to form a massive white elephant charging towards the lion.

Bang!! Both apparitions disappeared at the same time.

Duskdune Shura fell backwards like a kite that just had its string cut, his mouth still spitting a massive amount of blood mid air, as his face turned a deadly pale.

Da! Da! Da! Da!

A string of gunshots echoed, a massive amount of bullets landed on Garen, creating a ton of sparks, forcing him to take a few steps back. This machine gun’s bullet felt weird, it was incredibly strong, and even when it hit the body of Garen it felt like a string of needles had stabbed him.

"Run!" A sound came out of nowhere.

While Garen was still suppressed by the machine gun, Duskdune Shura immediately made a roll as soon as he landed and got back on his feet to run towards the depth of the pine forest.

When the gunshots finally stopped, Garen got back to his senses and noticed Duskdune Shura had ran, he quickly made chase.

"Running away already? You aren’t even done letting me experience all the forms of Seven Dragon Gate!"

With one running and the other chasing, the both of them ran even further away from the Werewolves’ formation, the elevation around them increased, it seemed they were headed uphill.