Even as the barrier around the Ultimate Phoenix Sect was broken open, the battle continued in the skies above as some of the assaulting ships made to land while the local ships had finally made it up in the air. Ruteran starfighters were included in that battle, including their ace pilot Ty Quigley. Before learning about personal cultivation he’d been above average, but he took to cultivation and Elder Intan’s training in swordsmanship like a fish to water. While others used their diverse weaponry to batter their way through enemy shields, he mainly focused on a more direct approach where his vehicle was the weapon. It had taken some convincing for Ruteran leaders to accept his odd approach, but as the majority of the expenses for his modified ship were paid for by others they had little reason to reject the attempt. It was effective, with him slicing his way through the fields of fire and any ships that stood in his way.

If Anton were going to judge it- and he was- the Ultimate Phoenix Sect’s control over fire was… fine. Average. Certainly, their fire was powerful, and their cultivators had some regenerative properties. They weren’t useless. They just weren’t as good as Anish or himself. Their buildings survived not due to precise control of the cultivators spewing flames everywhere but because they were specially made to resist the heat. That was all well and good if they fought in their own sect, but outside of it they would doubtless destroy things they didn’t intend to. That would include their allies.

The Ultimate Phoenix Sect had quite a variety of ways they displayed their flames, from powerful breaths to wreathing themselves in fire to fiery wings sprouting behind them, giving them a small measure of flight. They had the skill to not hurt themselves, and the cohesion to avoid hitting each other, but they would have had much greater attacking opportunities if they could fight freely.

The trifold alliance quickly exploited those tactics, weaving themselves between the enemies. Battles settled into close melees where weapons and personal flames reigned supreme instead of wide area attacks. In that manner the Ultimate Phoenix Sect held some advantage as their numbers were superior, but only on the surface. The Ultimate Phoenix Sect had somewhere around a hundred Life Transformation cultivators when the battle started, fewer than the trifold alliance. It was the thousand Essence Collection cultivators that were able to stop them from being instantly overwhelmed. They were, however, lacking Worldbinding cultivators- while the other side had Anton and the Great Queen to fill that power bracket.

And their numbers weren’t quite superior. Just as the Essence Collection cultivators were many in number… void ants were even greater. Rushing onto the battlefield behind the initial waves, the weaker void ants bundled themselves into larger rolling constructs. Flames struck them, but the power of those flames came from a reliance on natural energy. The lower ants weren’t entirely immune, but they could withstand incoming attacks long enough for others to rotate into the line of fire. The tumbling bundles of ants surprisingly sought out mostly Life Transformation cultivators- the difference in power between the stages was less relevant to them.

With their strongest cultivators being picked off by Anton and the Great Queen as well as swarmed by ants they could only kill in small bundles, the Life Transformation cultivators began to fall swiftly, freeing up the trifold alliance’s forces to cut down weaker cultivators who couldn’t all reach them at the same time.

The Ultimate Phoenix Sect quickly fell back to secure inner walls, but the speed at which their outer barrier had cracked open had thrown them off balance. No, losing their patriarch should have been the start of that. Instead of returning with a glorious victory and plunder, their claim to power had instead perished with many of their forces- including the all-important phoenixes.

As Anton continued to shatter their collars, more and more of them chose to fight against their captors. If Ceretos had once had its own phoenixes it had lost its native population, but there were always legends of such things- and their power and intelligence. Whether they were matched with humans was currently unclear- perhaps they might be more like void ants where mature members developed deeper sapience. Or like Paradise, such things might be an exception. But they weren’t stupid.

When they were free to act as they pleased, they either fled or took out their anger on those who had wronged them. Members of the Sect tried to draw upon the Phoenixes for recovery- they didn’t have a proper channel between them like the Great Queen determined the patriarch had, but there was some connection. Unfortunately, without the collars it was mostly pointless.

The Ultimate Phoenix Sect took shelter in the core of their sect, no doubt intending to huddle and wait for reinforcements. Anton could feel some forces ‘nearby’ stirring, indicating they might be gearing up to fight… but if they wanted to bring more than their very best, it would take them hours to cross the hundreds of kilometers between the sects. Otherwise, they had to rely on their starships… and those would still take some time.

As they stood around the core palace of the Ultimate Phoenix Sect, people were directed to looting and razing buildings. It wasn’t appropriate to do such things in battle, but a sufficient core watched the enemy sect for a response, ready to fight if they left their shelter. Meanwhile, the formation master Naid Conaire put together her head and the others with them to determine the best way to dissolve the inner barriers. The whole time, the Great Queen was nibbling at the bottom of the barrier. It was designed to deal with any sort of attack, but it couldn’t do much about its energy being torn out of it. Alone, the Great Queen would take a long time to deplete the energy reserves they had- but she had nothing better to do and the way they tried to fling attacks at her amused her. Whatever portion of the heat their abilities created that was not attributable to natural energy was ignorable, and none had sufficient power to harm her with anything else. Any who attempted to attack with thrown spears or arrows found that a small, quick target was extremely difficult to deal with- especially at the base of their walls. They had proper machicolations to target anyone of vaguely human size, but it was still awkward to target a moving thing less than fifteen centimeters in the longest dimension, right against the base of the wall.

Anton helped finish the battle in the skies, freeing up the starfighters to deal with any potential reinforcements. They were still some distance off, however, so Anton appreciated the few minutes of downtime. He breathed deeply, drawing upon the power of the local star. Though it had nearly led to his death, his first connection had been a critical learning experience and he had no regrets pushing for the most powerful Assimilation he could think of- even if he hadn’t fully understood what he was doing at the time.

Soon enough Naid had put together a plan of assault. Her diagrams showed where various people would attack- mainly the Great Queen, her royal guard, and Anton. The lesser void ants would be too vulnerable by the walls without distractions. “Fully analyzing a formation takes a long time,” Naid said, “So this will still be more or less brute forcing our way through. But that is what we can do with our given time constraints.”

Before they began the assault, the looters quickly deposited their last groups of spoils upon the ship- the outer region had been somewhat disappointing in their loot, but there would be more deeper within. And much of the purpose of this assault was to take everything they could- not because they needed it so much as that they wanted the Ultimate Phoenix Sect to have it… or anything. Though the shift of resources to their side would be a valuable result as well. Even simple shiny objects were enough to convince certain cultivators to provide things of actual utility, in trade back home.

When they began their assault, Anton focused his efforts on a single point, waiting until he felt the inner barrier straining to adapt to the variety of attacks before swapping to a condensed shot of Ascension energy. Golden energy snapped forward, striking the dome but not even slowing as it pierced a thin hole. Anton carried himself in with it, seeking the strongest enemy he could find. He swept low, driving up behind the ribcage, through the man’s heart and up into his skull. No doubt the cultivator could recover from some of that, but the final part meant there was little consciousness to try. A nearby phoenix melted away regardless, its life force torn out to no avail.

Speaking of phoenixes, they had no fear of flames. Those dozen who chose to fight had been patiently waiting for the barrier to go down, seeming to understand the cultivator’s intent. They had still been leery of the trifold alliance, of course- huddling together on the far side- but when they had the chance to attack their former masters they combined their efforts, filling the courtyard full of enemies with flames.

The Ultimate Phoenix Sect cultivators were of course resistant to fire, which was the only thing that stopped them from instantly perishing. Defending themselves from that assault made it difficult for them to coordinate against the cultivators as the barrier broke apart, the enchanted gates providing only moments of additional resistance, as they were tied to the same source of power.

Inside was a truly beautiful palace. Gold was of little value to cultivators, though it certainly had some aesthetic qualities, but Anton thought it could be overused. The Ultimate Phoenix Sect certainly had a large amount of gold to reflect flickering light inside, but they only used it as highlights. The main factors were gems- diamonds were used instead of crystal to scatter lights, fire opals- true fire opals with constant flames writhing within them- as well as precious metals and great art filled the palace. Anton thought it was a shame they couldn’t take it all, but frescoes and carved walls weren’t something they could loot in a reasonable timeframe.

And yes, he was already thinking about that because the last of the enemy sect was falling. Strangely enough, the incoming enemy forces were hardly even close, as if they never intended to protect their allies to begin with. And maybe they didn’t.

While some pried the most valuable bits out of the walls, tossing everything into freshly emptied storage bags, Anton went to the deepest parts of the palace where his energy had instantly wormed its way searching for the vaults. The formation masters came along, and soon they were prying open heavily reinforced doors- surrounded by walls that were at least as strong, else they could have torn their way through that way.

Inside the vault was… well, it was a large pile of wealth, but nothing Anton thought a sect with one of a hundred Worldbinding cultivators ought to have. He had several thoughts- perhaps it was stored elsewhere, if they were able to trust banks. Then there was the possibility that they preferred to display their wealth instead of having it. Finally… it could have been lost over time. Or recently.

The internal politics of the Sylanis Cluster weren’t exactly friendly. Perhaps the Ultimate Phoenix Sect’s loss of a Worldbinding cultivator had caused them to be cleaned out, to some extent. It was obvious they hadn’t actually been assaulted, but the loss of influence could have caused a rapid calling in of debts.

Anton shrugged. He would have preferred they profit more from this venture since they were doing it, but that wasn’t their only goal. It was for revenge, and to send a message. As they cleared out everything as quickly as they could, swiftly venturing into bedrooms and lobbing whole sealed chests into their storage bags, Anton considered how they would leave their more explicit message. Obviously razing the place to the ground would send a message- but he planned to carve some actual words as well.

He finally settled on something short, concise, melodramatic and yet true as far as he could enforce it. ‘You will gain nothing and lose everything’.

He worked with others to carve that into the rubble- with the power making the enchantments functional removed, the palace was torn down within the hour. Only at the tail end of it did Anton start shooting at approaching enemy ships as they returned to their own.

They took their loot and their dead, as well as the phoenixes that seemed to think they were the best method of egress, landing on their ships. Their starfighters returned to the larger ships hovering in orbit, and they began to pull away, distributing various sources of fuel as necessary for their return trip.

Several more ships fell to Anton as they drew further from Zimora- no point wasting an opportunity. He could have done more if he waited behind or shot to the very edge of his limits, but he didn’t want to push anything and bet on no Worldbinding Cultivators rushing in from nearby planets. Nor did he want to give away his exact range information, though if they counted down to the kilometer the enemy would likely be surprised in his next engagement. Anton was always on a path to improvement as much as possible, and he found shooting with no resistance to be something he quite liked practicing. Range was one of his great strengths, and he would never say he had enough.