Grand Ancestral Bloodlines

BANG!

At that moment, from the fog, a pair of ghostly fingers reached out, only to be shredded to pieces by the spatial fluctuations accumulating along Ryu's own fingers.

These days, Ryu almost found it distasteful to use any of his other strengths. Attacking, defending, moving and evading all felt so much easier when he relied on his Soul Nature that everything else almost paled in comparison.

The moment he sensed danger, he reacted on instinct, accumulating a seemingly benign pulse of spatial energy that shredded the target apart as though it had just met the concentrated point of a blackhole. However, almost the moment he did, Ryu shook his head.

'This habit is not a good one.'

Ryu adjusted himself and corrected his thoughts immediately.

Yes, his Soul Nature was incredibly powerful, this was undeniable. In fact, because it was his Soul Nature, whereas most had to use up a great amount of stamina to utilize the laws of space, to Ryu, it was as easy as breathing.

However, although these things were true, it was still necessary for him to access the circumstances and react accordingly. Why would he use spatial qi when facing a wraith when he had the best counter to ghosts in all of existence?

Tribulation lightning.

No matter how little stamina he consumed using spatial qi, how could it compare to the ease of killing these targets with lightning? It was easy to get caught up in the amazing nature of spatial qi because it could accomplish so much, so powerfully. It wasn't a rare affinity without reason. But there would also be times where he would unconsciously end up handicapping himself just for the sake of using his Soul Nature.

Ryu identified the problem the fixed it immediately.

His hand reached out an a large amount of lightning formed in his palm. Usually, he would use normal lightning so as not to expose his Lightning Qilin bloodline, but while he hadn't cultivated much in the last several years, what he had great improved upon was his state of mind and mostly importantly the control he had over his own strength and talents.

Almost the moment the Tribulation Lightning form, he activated his Lightning God talent and restrained its aura into a small needle the width of a single hair that was also just about a foot or so long. Despite the thinness of the needle, the blue steel radiance it gave off was so bright that it practically dispersed the fog around him.

Aantha's eyes locked onto the needle hovering above Ryu's right palm, another shudder of fear racing through her body. She had hardly recovered from his earlier glare when he suddenly tapped the air and caused the void to shred to pieces, and now he had suddenly brought out another attack that seemed even more powerful that the spatial fluctuation from before.

And how could it not be? That earlier tap was just a casual wave of the hand, but this needle, while it was thin, contained enough lightning to raze an entire forest to the ground. The fact Aantha could sense the danger at all, though, just went to show just how sharp her senses were.

Ryu continued to walk forward, Matrix hovering in one palm and needle hovering in the other. From time to time his fingers would flicker and the needle would zoom outward, shredding a wraith to pieces before zooming back to him.

They couldn't last even a single attack. Just a single poke cleansed away all of their hatred and animosity, stripping them down to the purest of states and shipping them off into reincarnation.

Ryu reoriented himself a few times.

If he was correct, these should be the outer reaches of whatever Sect or Clan fell here. If Radiant Star Sect was used as an example, or rather the former Radiant Star Sect on the First Heaven, this region would be the equivalent to outside its gates, the very location that Ryu and the other prospective Outer Disciples had waited for a chance to prove themselves.

Due to this, there were no real clues about the power of the Sect or Clan, or even what they specialized in.

Although there were wraiths around, they had long since lost their former techniques and were basically just mindless ghosts. Only experts that had been extraordinarily powerful in their lifetimes would be able to retain their abilities after becoming a wraith, and only such existences would be able to give Ryu clues to what he needed to know.

However, the likelihood that such existences would appear here were slim. Although there was a good chance that this Ruin would err on the side of being more powerful than not, Ryu didn't believe that the Heavenly Path would allow Sky God level threats to appear here. That said, Ryu remained cautious and was ready for anything.

By this point, most had chosen to follow after Ryu, a fact to which he had yet to react. This was a fairly novel situation for Ryu, he couldn't remember anyone ever having treated him like this before. Quite frankly, he found it annoying, but he was entirely focused on the task at hand. When the time came, he would deal with these people thoroughly.

He wouldn't allow his Heavenly Favor to be split between himself and others.

Ryu came to a stop and looked up.

The hazy form of a large and looming gate stood ahead, which meant that he had indeed come to the correct place. This should be the entrance to the Sect or Clan. However, even so, his eyes narrowed for quite a simple reason: the gates were closed.

If this was a Sect or Clan that had been destroyed and then left their legacy behind using the methods of a Ruin, it made little sense for their gate to even be intact, let alone closed.

Obviously the first thing an enemy would do in destroying a powerful was to bash in their front door, it was common sense.

'Interesting…'

Ryu stepped forward, looking at the several wells that made up the large and looming gate.