1797 Ethereal

Graham had noticed the sudden reappearance of his sister and Hao Ya below on the teleportation formation and had thus fought his opponent as hard as he could to defeat him.

As soon as he was done with that fight, he rushed down to protect them regardless of the fact that the person who was making his way down was quite strong himself.

One of the people beside the ax-wielding man noticed Graham and quickly pulled out a spear to kill him.

He moved forward, charging his attack as he shot out a large illusory spear formed out of water Qi toward Graham.

Graham held the giant Darksteel, which glowed with the faintest white outline, as he used his Sword Intent to give his all in the attack.

Graham swung Darksteel as the water spear arrived right in front of him, giving no sense of threat to his attack at all. And yet, when the attack landed, he destroyed the Water spear so very easily and made his way beyond toward the man who attacked him.

The man quickly pulled out a talisman to protect himself and created a barrier using it.

Graham swung his sword once again and smashed the barrier in, destroying it in a single swing while also cleaving the man in half with a single attack.

With a person who was only in the early Saint Transformation realm, he did not have to worry about the fact that they would have Immortal Qi at all.

As the cleaved corpse of the man fell from the sky, the various other soldiers slowly brought their weapons, worried, but ready to fight.

The man wielding the ax quickly put out a hand to stop them all.

Then, he moved forward a little, clearly vigilant, and stared at Graham for a long moment. He wondered what treasure Graham was using to hide his aura. The man believed that Graham was playing at being weak so as to catch others off guard.

After a long moment, the man smiled. "You guys go deal with the women. If you can't beat them, try to just keep them from leaving. I'll handle him and be right there," the man said.

"Yes, leader," the few soldiers said.

"Leader?" Graham asked. "A battalion leader? No wonder you are so strong."

"I am Yu Ha--"

"I don't care," Graham said. "I do not need to know who you are to fight you."

"Oh, but won't you want to know who will kill you?" the man asked as his large double-handed ax glowed with soft golden energy.

Graham prepared his Darksteel with a soft glowing white outline and prepared as well. "I've been through a fate worse than death already. I will gladly welcome it when it comes for me," he said. "But that day will not be today."

The man smiled with a wicked smile. "We'll see about that."

The two attacked at the same time and started fighting.

* * * * * *

Down at the large platform for the teleportation formation, both Liz and Hao Ya were somewhat glad that someone had come to save them from the person who was so obviously going to overpower them.

At the same time, they were both worried for Graham as he wasn't very fit to fight someone at the peak of the Saint Transformation realm and perhaps a little beyond in terms of strength.

Not to mention the Immortal Qi such a person would have was not something Graham could so easily ignore.

But, this was not the time for them to get distracted.

Despite the fact that the stronger of the people had been stopped, the others were still coming down for them, and these were people who were going to be hard to handle, let alone kill.

"We need to let Alex know what is happening," Liz said quickly and looked up to search for him, but his battle had led him somewhere she could not immediately find amidst the tens of thousands of people.

And she didn't have the time to search. The people were right upon them.

"I'll try to save you if they use Immortal Qi. Other than that, I won't be of much help," Hao Ya said as she brought out a brilliant green sword with an emerald sheen that looked as though it came right out of an Immortal's treasure.

It was a treasure that her master had given her when she had successfully evolved her physique from a Divine rank physique to a Celestial rank physique a long time ago.

She had been handed this very sword that day and had been told about its origin: a treasure created by one of the many that had held the name of the Artifact God.

This one was a little special in that it was one of the final few swords the Artifact God had made before he had vanished from the world.

There were some texts that suggested that the 'Artifact God' could even have been the Sage of Ten Thousand Treasures himself.

The name it was given by that god was Jade Fang, and today was the first time Hao Ya was using it in a serious battle.

As the people from the sky came down close enough to target them, Hao Ya moved.

She activated her short-range movement technique, the Seven Misty steps, teleporting 7 times in a short burst to arrive right before the man as she swung her thin sword.

A verdant green energy appeared from her sword at the same time as she swung it. The energy from her sword was weak, but when the energy from the attack came into contact with the energy of her enemy who had used a technique to protect himself, a burst of vines suddenly appeared around him, capturing him with the vines.

The vines were rather weak in terms of strength, as they were formed primarily by Hao Ya's Qi, which was quite weak. As such, they were easily destroyed by the man.

Realizing that he had no reason to worry, the man stabbed forward with his spear at Hao Ya.

At the same time, the woman that was next to the man came to attack Hao Ya as well, throwing a sword slash formed of fiery energy.

Both attacks came for Hao Ya, but she remained still, not moving at all. Instead, her body suddenly glowed a soft green light, slowly becoming see-through as both of those attacks came for her.

Hao Ya was not just see-through at all. Her entire body had become ethereal at that very moment, and all attacks that came for her simply passed through her without hurting her in the slightest.

The two soldiers looked at Hao Ya with absolute shock as they tried to see what sort of treasures she was using to do such a thing.

But of course, there was no treasure that Hao Ya was doing. This was something she had been capable of doing long ago since she began her cultivation journey.

She could make her body illusory so that no attacks could hurt her at all. No weapon or physical attacks could touch her at all.

That was the boon she received when she was born with the Spiritborne Ethereal Physique.