Chapter 0172

Everyone looked at Tempest then at each other. They had the same thought, “Tempest is a fool.”

Tempest was the quintessential fool in the eyes of her group members. A fool who asks stupid questions acts like the impossible is possible and accepts people as they are, faults and all. Only a fool like Tempest would trust Bei Ting Mao, who might or might not be a demonic cultivator who’s method of cultivation is to sow seeds of doubt and dissension and harvest the fruit of other’s cultivation. Only a fool would become friends with a potential threat to their life.

“Well?”

“Well, what?”

“How do we get out of here?” Tempest asked impatiently. “I told you, I’m on a timeline here. I can’t be spending my precious time on incidentals.”

Bei Ting Mao smiled. He was glad nothing had changed between them. “You do remember the man summoning the Abyssal Chimera right?”

“Yes.”

“I think he is the man that summon the Abyssal Chimera.”

“Okay,” Tempest replied. “Now how do we get out of here.”

Bei Ting Mao smiled turned upside down. A fool has a fool’s prerogative. Bei Ting Mao likes the foolish Tempest who lays almost everything on the table, is stupidly blunt and ignorant and most of all he likes the Tempest who would go to great lengths to help her friends.

He had to wonder if the fool he considers a friend thinks of him as a friend. Perhaps not.

“Tempest, we already talked about how powerful cultivators are when they fight their inner demons. Add in the ability to open a tear in space and they become very dangerous.”

“So?”

“That guy down there can tear open space and he’s fighting his inner demons. He is very dangerous.” Fenix tried to patiently explain. If they weren’t in a life or death situation then Fenix would have pounced on Tempest and beat her into a pig head.

“Yes, but what does our getting out of here has to do with the guy below. Can’t we sneak away?”

Everyone, “...”

Tempest brought up a good point. They didn’t have to fight the cultivator below. They can sneak out. If he notices them, they can run. After a while, he’d get caught up with his inner demons he’d forget about them.

Actually, a few group members had considered running away from the mad cultivator below, Starm being one of them, however, the lure of treasures from the chaotic rift was an almost irresistible temptation.

Hannah Trellis mentioned Tempest snatching treasures from the chaotic rift previously but they didn’t believe her because, well, its Tempest. Tempest who throws out sealed level 10 to 15 weapons.

Some could say mages are lazy creatures or that they have no imagination. Aside from their cultivation status, which tends to be confusing due to the dual rating system, mages use numbers to rate everything else. The mages say numerical makes it easy to remember things. They don’t have to remember high-level top grade or top grade heavenly level blah blah blah. Just give them numbers and give them an example and they are fine.

In Tempest’s case, she threw out sealed level 10 to 15 weapons with a possible +1. The +1 represents the upgrade to the weapon due to the presence of a weapon spirit. A level 10 weapon could have a +1 because it has a weapon spirit while a level 15 weapon might not have a weapon spirit.

The most powerful weapon measured by the Magus Alliance is the Sky Cleaving Sword at level 19 +1.

Tempest, the fool, fool, fool, would probably ask how much money she can get for this treasure or that treasure if she did find anything.

All they had to do was wait for Tempest to have the time to present her findings to them in a secure location and then bargain with her. Everyone was strangely confident Tempest would share some of the treasures she found with them.

Since Tempest hadn’t mentioned any treasures she may or may not have gotten from the chaotic rift, everyone had a hopeful attitude but they won’t press her for answers. She’d talk when she is ready to talk.

As such, when they encountered the cultivator who was capable of opening a chaotic rift, they wanted to take the chance to challenge the cultivator in hopes he might open another chaotic rift in his deranged state of mind or during his fight against them.

As a side note, Starm can’t open a chaotic rift, much to his everlasting regret. Opening a chaotic rift takes too much destruction mana, so much so that it might permanently destroy the balance in his body. “Besides,” Starm had pointed out, “there is a permanent chaotic rift close by. I don’t need to waste massive amounts of energy to open a chaotic rift when they can just wait until we are officially members of the Eternal Spirit Guild and get permission to head over there.”

Tempest, on the other hand, was thinking of ways to get out of here. She carefully inched her way over to the edge of the ledge and peered over.

The man was still fighting shadows and arguing with himself in those creepy voices. One moment his moves were filled with frantic energy as he swung his sword then the next moment his attack was swift and deadly.

“What is the best method of escape?” Tempest thought to herself.

Trying to sneak out by walking along the ledge was out. The ledge they were on extend 25 meters one way and 10 meters another. Afterward, it is sheer cliffs from there. Furthermore, the group would be exposed to attacks from the madman below.

Flying could be a viable alternative. They would get further away, but again flight would expose them to attacks from the madman below.

Fire, earth. There is a fire mage in their group as well as an earth mage. The two guys should be able to cook something up.

“Fire and earth mages, you have anything that could protect us from the lava?”

Bei Ting Mao shook his head no.

Graden took the task of explaining their problem, “Magma or lava is a combination of fire and earth elements. We aren’t skilled enough to combined our two elements together to protect against the lava. A mage with both fire and earth can do it but a weak fire and a weak earth mage can’t do it.”

“Starm, how about you? Can you do anything about the lava?” Tempest didn’t want to ask the token bun but given his versatility, he should have a method in dealing with the lava.

“Of course I can,” Starm cheerfully said, please his Big Sis Tempest was back to normal, “for about a minute. Then my mana runs out and we’ll be in trouble.”

Tempest’s hope shot up when Starm said he could deal with the lava, then shot right down by the last part of his sentences. She had forgotten Starm couldn’t use massive amount of mana without suffering the consequences.

“Do we need to sneak out? The madman below won’t notice us if we just up and walk out.” Fenix proposed a solution but it was immediately shot down by Bei Ting Mao and Li Ming.

“If he does notice us, what then?” Bei Ting Mao sneered, “Throw you forward as bait?” Having experience fighting his inner demons first hand, Bei Ting Mao thought the rest of his group member was underestimating the man too much. Not only was he powered up by his inner demon, but his cultivation also has to be high. How else can he summon an Abyssal Chimera otherwise?

“Oh, good idea.” Tempest immediately jumped on the idea. “But instead of tossing Fenix out there, we’ll use Graden’s plant instead. I’m sure they would buy us enough time to run if we were noticed.”

“What? No! Never! Knock that idea out of your head right away Tempest. I’m never sacrificing my beauties to your hair brain idea. Do you know long it took me to grow them? Ten years. It took me ten years to grow them as big as they are now and you want me to toss them out as distractions. I will not!” Graden made a move to knock some sense into Tempest. She’s been long overdue.

“Don’t you have seeds?”

“You’re asking me to waste ten years of hard work!”

“After we get out of here with all our lives intact, I’ll work with Starm to grow you, several new ladies, for you to play with. I’m sure Starm can manipulate time well enough to replicate your previous efforts.”

“The offer sounds nice but your wording seems wrong.” Graden was glad Fenix responded in his place because he didn’t know what to say to Tempest. Her wordings did sound wrong depending on the interpretation of the listener.

“Do you even know how hard it is to grow plants. Look at these seeds,’’ Graden took out a bunch of seeds to show Tempest. “To grow my beauties from these seeds take time, blood, sweat and tears!”

Tempest grabbed the seeds and threw them into one of many pockets on her mage robe. She was about to open her mouth and berate Graden for discounting their friendship for flowers but snapped her mouth shut as everyone felt the aura of madman coming their way.

“Run!”