Molting the Mortal Coil

Chapter 979: Timing

Feeling the halfway mark of the room right behind him, Sage walked around the strange tree and continued to grow more of the tree wall till the tree at the center of the room was a seamless part of it. Then he stopped growing the Sacred Banyan and switched to outputting another kind of energy, touching the wood wall hed created and sending it inside. In just a few minutes he used up much of his Poison Qi and now the wall of brambles in front of him was releasing a cloud of multi-colored gas. Purple, pink, red, and white swirled and shifted through the thousands of layers of interwoven wooden vines and branches like a fairy wonderland of clouds.

Nightmare Garden. A poison that went along well with his wood natured Qi abilities, the beautifully colored gas that the poisoned plants released was not harmful to them, and their effect upon non-plant life was far less obvious than other poisons. It caused the senses of those that were poisoned to grow dull, and their bodies to feel much too warm. It was a sort of sweating inebriation that also had a more insidious secondary effect. The area covered by the multi-colored gas became somewhat chaotic. Non-plant life in the area had to spend much more effort transforming this chaotic energy into Qi for their own use, greatly reducing the rate they could recover their Qi.

Since the multi-colored gas only extended a short distance from each plant, all they had to do was leave the area covered by the Nightmare Garden to start returning to normal. It was very much a sort of area denial poison, creating a place where things were greatly to Sages advantage. With the addition of the Nightmare Garden to the thick tree wall, the damage that was inflicted suddenly began to drop. Sage only had to send his Qi into the Sacred Banyan that hed created to control and monitor its shape and area of influence. He could feel just how much of it was damaged and use that to track the path of the enemy through the wall that was already dozens of feet thick.

Whatever was on the other side of the wall had already tunneled a third of the way through the wall by the time hed use the Nightmare Garden poison. Thankfully, the poison had an almost immediate effect, making those attacking pause for a bit. The sudden dulling of ones senses was disorienting and when combined with the multi-colored gas theyd pull back and try to deal with the strange sight before pushing ahead. After being poisoned by Sage before, the Beast Keeper would probably be cautious about falling into such a trap again. Sage didnt expect the situation to last long, but it would slow down their attack to buy them some more time.

He took a few steps back and threw out another set of glowing seeds, starting to grow a new set of Sacred Banyans from nothing. This was slower than expanding the size of the already existing wood wall, but there was a reason for this separation. At the same time a few long branches extended from the first wooden wall and reached over to where the Purple Mist Sect was smashing against the gate blocking their way. Sage went over to join them as this new wall turned out to look more like a giant shrubbery. Instead of spanning from floor to ceiling and slowly growing thicker, this one covered the open space from wall to wall and slowly started to grow taller.

The enemy smashing a tunnel through the first wall returned to action again. Sage guessed they either finished their tests or just gave up on them and started attacking again. Behind him the Purple Mist Sect members kept rotating and assaulting the gate. In front of him, the new wall was now chest height making it more of a really wide fence. In the race against time, the four students and four staff members became visibly anxious. The sounds of wood being smashed and cracked was now loud enough for them to hear. The students started to walk forward to try and help, but the two teachers held them back. Even the two fifth rank teachers werent helping as they would just get in the way.

The second wall rose up to head height, finally making the first wall disappear from their view. At the same time, the crashing sounds got louder, already so close to breaching the first wall completely. Sage frowned and quickly altered the second wall so that the front of it suddenly grew faster than the rest. Shooting upwards to meet the ceiling. It was not a moment too soon either, as just a second later the first wall crumbled. A tunnel twenty feet wide was carved straight through it, smashing apart the many layers of wood to reach this open path between the two walls.

Sage couldnt see what was going on behind the second wall that was now more than three quarters of the way to the ceiling. He could only tell that there was a wide tunnel clean through the first wall and he hoped that whatever Beast was responsible for making it was now pacing back and forth in the open space between the two walls. Hopefully, all the Beasts were walking in that area. This hope was actually related to why hed made two separate walls in the first place.

Out of time, Sage had to switch his focus away from growing the second wall. Instead he sent poison into it just like hed done for the first wall. Except this time, the poison was not Nightmare Garden. Instead, he used a somewhat similar poison: Fire Garden. It was also a poison that was carried harmlessly within plants, which was unsurprising given it had the same source as Nightmare Garden. The difference in name made it quite obvious what it did.

When the second wall of wood was completely filled with the poison, the Beasts had already started to strike it. Thankfully, the front of the wall rose to the ceiling or else whatever monsters were gathered over there might have leapt on top of the wall and rushed directly towards him. A tiny mote of white flame appeared on Sages finger and as he pushed his hand forward, the flame grew to the size of a melon before flying out and striking the second wall in front of him. At the same time, Sage stepped down upon the long single branch that led to the first wall and sent his Qi into it to take control again.

The previously inert and motionless first wall suddenly started to move. At the area further away from him, and closest to the original gates to the enclosure, the wall shifted and the seemingly solid wooden branches started to move, slithering together and sealing up the path that had been tunneled through the first wall. The white flame hit the lattice of the second wall and suddenly ignited with frightful speed.

Fire Garden was the same poison that Sages daughter Yujie used. It changed the infected plants to act similar to a candle, making them easier to ignite and when lit they would keep burning for a very long time. The white flame spread across the second wall like a wave, transforming from a simple solid barrier into a sea of fire. The back of the first wall bent downwards and dipped into the flames of the second wall. With this bridge, the fire spread from the second wall to the first. Despite moving at a much more normal pace, it was still likely to terrify the beasts that were now stuck in the aisle between the two walls. Their way back was blocked by the trees hed shaped to close up the tunnel. Sage wasnt foolish enough to think this small obstruction would stop the Beasts from escaping back out of the enclosure, but it would certainly slow them down and improve the damage the flames could do to them.