Ma Rong could feel the bones in his shoulder shatter into pieces and bore into his flesh as he was thrown backwards from the force of the blow, but he barely registered any pain. His mind was strangely calm as he sailed through the air towards a massive tree. Time stretched out even further, giving him ample room to think about all the things that weren't important right now.

He hadn't used to be this fragile. He hadn't used to be this weak. He hadn't used to be this helpless. He felt almost entirely disconnected from his body, like his mind was drifting around in an empty space far away from the worries of the physical world.

Was this the calmness right before death that he had so often heard about? It felt light… easy… comfortable. If he just let go now, his struggles would be over. He could just fall unconscious, maybe never to wake up again. It would be like falling into a soft sea of clouds. So easy…

No. He refused to accept that. The hit he had taken was bad, but not deadly. More importantly, he still had too much left to do. There were people he couldn't disappoint out there. Liu Wei. Lan Shi. Meng Hui. And his disciple… yes, his disciple, Guang Lai! He couldn't leave him to fend for himself just yet. He couldn't disappoint all of them!

Hundreds upon hundreds of years ago, Ma Rong had perfectly unified his Soul and Body. Losing control like this was unacceptable. He strained his soul, forcing it to focus on its connection to his body.

He… Ma Rong… refused. To let. GO!

The world snapped into focus again and time resumed its normal flow. Ma Rong met the tree he had been thrown against, but he didn't crash into it. Instead, the bark and wood softened to cushion his impact, gently catching him and wrapping around him to keep him upright. He calmly watched the Earth cultivator chase after him to finish the job as he sunk deeper into the trunk. When he was just a couple of meters away and already drawing his arm back for another punch, the wood closed up, fully enclosing Ma Rong.

With a loud crunch the punch impacted the wood, shockwaves coursing through both the tree and the ground. It was quickly followed up by half a dozen high-pressured beams of water that pierced through the trunk entirely. But Ma Rong simply wasn't anywhere near where they had hit anymore. He emerged a good ten meters above them, his eyes already focused on his real target.

Before anyone could react, five massive roots burst from the ground all around the wind cultivator who had stayed back to deal with Ma Rong's previous attacks, all striking at her at once. She managed to dodge the first two and deflect the third one with her sword, but the fourth hit her straight in the head.

Now it was her turn to be thrown into a tree, and this one wasn't anywhere near as kind to her as Ma Rong's had been to him. Like a fist striking out, a thick cylinder of wood shot out from the trunk, hitting her in the head once more. The way she collapsed didn't leave any doubt that she wouldn't be standing up again anytime soon.

With a deep groan, Ma Rong separated himself from the tree, pushing himself off the wood to dodge the projectiles thrown his way.

He swallowed his pain. This fight was by no means won just because he had taken out one of his four opponents. This attack alone had taken a lot out of him, and his physical condition was still disastrous. He had used the short time inside the tree to somewhat rearrange the bones in his shoulder into a more manageable state by pressuring it with the wood and he had already taken several of his strongest healing pills, but there was still no way he was going to use his right arm in the next couple of days, let alone this fight.

Still, with the wind cultivator out of the picture, he was now free to use the trick he had been holding back. As he continued to evade ever more attacks, he materialized a small, inconspicuous ball of glass from his spatial ring. It was filled with an amorphous white substance and despite its small size, it weighed heavy in his hand.

For a moment, he hesitated. This hadn't been tested in proper combat yet and he honestly had no idea how well it would perform. It very much depended on whether his enemies realized quickly how to properly respond to it and if they possessed some way to counter it, he hadn't considered.

Well, nothing to do but try now. He dashed closer to his enemies and threw the ball at them. Reacting quickly, Xiyu Zhai targeted it with several of her beams, hitting and shattering it with the third one as it was just about half-way between the two.

An impressive display of situational awareness and aim, had this ball been a direct attack she would have effectively neutralized, or at least given her team time to evade it. Unfortunately for her, it wasn't an attack. Ma Rong could have just as easily thrown it at his own feet to the same effect; he had merely chosen to try and confuse them as much as possible.

As soon as the ball shattered, the liquid inside vaporized into a thick white mist that spread out explosively in all directions. Within seconds, it had swallowed the entire area, obscuring the sight of anything more than an arm's length away like exceptionally heavy fog. That was, of course, merely the start of what this mist actually did.

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Cultivators like him and his enemies didn't need to rely on eyesight, their soul sense would guide them through the deepest darkness without issue. He could hear one of his enemies quietly curse as they undoubtedly realized that that had just become impossible.

Ma Rong grinned slyly. It was working. This fog was one of his original creations, one of the most complex at that. He had spent many nights searching for a way to counter one of the cultivator's most reliable tools, his myriad attempts at blocking it outright doomed to fail, before devising this fog.

It served to the soul sense like a thousand little mirrors would to the eye, misdirecting it, pulling it apart, stretching it in some places while compressing it in others. Above became below in one place, only to become sideways centimeters next to it. Stationary objects would appear to perpetually move at fast paces. Every signal one could pick up on became misdirecting, every impression a misimpression. It made the soul sense utterly useless at what it was supposed to do.

In fact, even just keeping the soul sense activated within this mist was so nauseating that trying to do so for more than a couple of seconds had consistently made the disciples who had helped him with testing throw up. These effects only redoubled in impact when one started moving around.

Ma Rong shut off his soul sense. Within this fog, the only senses one could rely upon to locate anything were hearing and touch. This was, of course, rather advantageous to someone like him because he had access to ample amounts of both. His consciousness spread out through the forest once more.

Suddenly, everything was clear again. He kept his eyes closed, for he didn't need the little vision they afforded him anymore. He knew exactly where his enemies were, he could feel every unconfident movement they made. This fog was a weapon that he had perfectly tailored to his advantages, turning an ability that was relatively minor in the context of combat into an advantage so massive that there were really only two counters, both of which amounted to avoiding facing him.

One could either remove the fog, which was why he had needed to take down the wind cultivator before employing it, or they could remove themselves from the fog. In other words: run.

Ma Rong would not give the three any time to realize that they had just turned from hunters to hunted. He took off into the air so the earth cultivator couldn't sense where he was through his steps, then started circling them. At the same time, he animated the forest, strengthening its many noises to confuse them even further while silently raising dozens upon dozens of roots out of the ground, their ends sharpened into barbed blades.

Then, without warning, he struck. Like ambushing snakes, the roots shot out of the fog at the unprepared targets, accompanied by nothing but a silent whistle as they cut through the air. Xiyu Zhai reacted just in time to deflect one of them and shifted her body around, so two more missed her and a fourth only grazed her neck slightly.

The earth cultivator had extended his earthen armor to cover his entire body, which blocked two of the roots. A third pierced straight through though, running him through the stomach. He stumbled several meters backwards before catching himself and sending several rocks flying in the direction the roots had come from.

The other water cultivator did much worse than both though. Failing to deflect, dodge or even just shift, three roots found his torso, tearing straight through his armor. One left a deep cut in his shoulder, another pierced his side and a third impaled him straight through the heart. He could only let out a silent whimper before keeling over and dropping to the ground.

The roots kept up their attacks against the two remaining cultivators, repeatedly retreating into the fog only to strike again moments later. Now that they were prepared, they could somewhat deal with them, Xiyu Zhai managing to cut three of them apart before raising her voice.

"Retreat!"

She didn't wait around to see who was following her command, shooting up into the air as fast as she could. The earth cultivator ripped the root out of his stomach before sinking into the ground.

That was a terrible idea on his part, because the ground was absolutely filled with roots. He didn't make it more than a couple of meters before being completely wrapped in them, holding him in place and smothering him.

He fought back with both his strength and his Dao, but as much as he had been able to pressure Ma Rong earlier, he was only at the third stage compared to the latter's sixth. In a direct battle of strength like this he stood little to no chance, especially not while he was constantly losing blood from the hole in his stomach. As his resistance slowly faded, thorns started sprouting from the roots, digging into his flesh and expediting his unsavory end.

If he had accomplished nothing else, he had bought Xiyu Zhai time for her escape. As soon as his heart had stopped beating, Ma Rong shot up into the air to give chase. His shoulder screamed in protest at his speed, but he made it out of the fog in seconds. He searched the horizon, spotting the woman flying away in the direction of her camp.

He rushed to follow her, only to be stopped by a staggering onset of sudden dizziness. He plummeted several meters before catching himself. He desperately tried forcing himself to speed up, but once more failed to do so. He had no strength left. He shot one last gaze at the woman whose silhouette slowly grew smaller and smaller. Then he sank back to the ground.

When Ma Rong landed, he realized that he was standing right beside the unconscious wind cultivator. With a last stretch of his will, he wrapped her in a thick cocoon of roots and vines that she wouldn't be able to break out off for days. Then he staggered to a nearby tree and sank to the ground at its base.

He had failed. Despite all his efforts, the information about their presence and location would reach the Roaring Thunder Sect. He needed… to inform… someone… But he couldn't think straight anymore.

The pain in his shoulder grew numb and his eyelids fell shut as the world around him faded away into gray nothingness.

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