I Reincarnated As A Stick

Chapter 179: Otherworldly Visitor

Since Argentum was close to the barrier, which in turn allowed him to hear the words Chonk shouted after he broke the barrier, he could not help but madly laugh at the success of his plan. Not only that, since he had another perspective of the army through the soul balls, he also saw the expression of fear on Chonk’s face from a top-down view, making him laugh even harder as he watched Chonk command his army to move farther away from the barrier.

Eventually, Argentum let out a sigh of contentment as he sat down on the ground as he muttered to himself, “And with that, I think I can call Herellia and the other alliance members to surround Chonk’s army. Since they’re going to distance themselves from the barrier thanks to my intervention, this would allow Herellia and the alliance members to have more time…I think.”

“Does the alliance have members that can allow other members to teleport?” While Argentum was wondering about this in his mind, a notification sound resounded throughout his mind as a holographic screen appeared on his screen not long after. This notification sound stopped his train of thought, prompting him to look at the text on the holographic screen in front of him. It did not take long for Argentum to become shocked as a halo of green light gradually manifested over his head.

Noticing this, he could not help but mutter to himself in slight wonder, “Who knew that fusing low-level spells would increase the progress of mastering a Tempering skill by a lot?”

Ding!

‘The user has conjured the [Nature’s Wind Drill] spell without relying on the mastery of the Tempering skill.  Due to the conjured spell having the strength of a simple Level 1 spell, the system has increased the progress of the user’s Tempering skill by 15 percent.’

‘The user has achieved 25% progress on [Divine Wind Spirit]. The user now has access to the [Tempest’s Envoy] spell.’

‘The user has achieved 25% progress on [Divine Wind Spirit]. The second Tempering process shall now commence.’

Not long after he finished reading through the text on the screen, the halo of green light over his head started to intensify in brightness as it gradually increased its speed of rotation. Eventually, the halo of green light had reached a peak, bringing up a small hurricane as it instantly shrunk in diameter, passing through his forehead as a plethora of Wind energy particles started coursing throughout his body one more time.

Fortunately, since he was still at war, unlike the first Tempering process, the second Tempering process took less time, taking around thirty seconds at most for all of the cells in his body to become more inclined towards the Wind element.

Ding!

‘The user has undergone the second Tempering process. Intelligence has been increased by 3 points, Vitality has been increased by 1 point, and Agility has been increased by 2 points. The user must reach 50% progress in the Tempering skill to undergo the third Tempering process.’

With the Wind energy particles dissipating in his body after enhancing the build of his cells, he stood up and moved his body in a few bizarre ways, allowing him to know the minute improvements he had obtained in the Agility and Vitality stat. As for the increase in Intelligence, he started calculating in his mind once more, finish his test a few seconds later as he let out a satisfied sigh.

“This Tempering skill is seriously great,” Argentum said to himself with a light smile. He then muttered, “Once this war is over, I’m seriously going to enhance this Tempering skill to its limit.”

“Speaking of which, what’s the [Tempest’s Envoy] spell about?” Thinking about the spell he had acquired just a while ago, he commanded the system to show the spell’s description, which made his eyes widen as he let out a grin. Not long after, he thought about the possible ways he could maximize the effects of the spell as he muttered to himself, “Man, this new spell is just like the [Tempest Burst] spell I had back then. Speaking of which, I wonder what happened to that skill. Did it disappear after I evolved my movement skill?”

“Anyways, I’ll leave this body here for now,” Argentum continued to mutter as he decided to pass the control back to his original body, only taking a few seconds to do so. “I should tell Herellia to make a move now.”

Whoosh!

With the control back at his original body, which had been camouflaged on top of the alliance base, he hastily commanded the alliance system in his system to connect him with Herellia as he gradually adjusted himself to his body. Fortunately, thanks to Herellia being vigilant for any message Aurus would send her, the connection between the two had been successfully made in the first instance.

“You finally called, Aurus,” Herellia said with a slightly joyful tone through the connection.

“I apologize for taking a while.” Hearing Herellia’s tone, Aurus could not help but talk in a joyful tone as well while apologizing. Not long after, he added, “Anyways, I’ve already done what I did. It’s time for the alliance to ambush Chonk’s army.”

For some unknown reason, rather than responding to his statement, Herellia lightly coughed in response for a bit. Just as Aurus was about to ask if she was okay, Herellia finally talked, saying, “Alright. We’ll be there as soon as possible. I’d like it if you cornered Chonk before I come there. Also, leave the members of his army alive.”

With him hearing Herellia’s last statement, Aurus could not help but become confused as to why she would make such a request. Fortunately, Herellia answered his doubts before he could ask them, adding on, “You’ll see why later.”

“Alright then,” Aurus responded to Herellia’s request before letting out a soft sigh. After that, he cut off the connection between them as he used the soul balls he was manipulating to check in on Chonk’s army, which was getting closer and closer to the territory they were residing at a while ago. Although Aurus thought that the distance made was too much for him, once he thought about it from Chonk’s perspective, he thought that this distance did make sense, since a magic spell with that kind of power could probably be shot from a long distance.

Nonetheless, with this level of distance, Aurus did not have to worry about getting found by Chonk’s army, disabling his morphing skill as he summoned Fenrir and Charisa out of his system once more.

Whoosh! Whoosh!

A few seconds later, a wolf sculpture and a curvy stick covered in flames appeared to his left and right, both radiating subservient auras as they simultaneously said, “Master.”

“Sorry for abruptly keeping you two in the system back then,” Aurus could not help but radiate an aura of guilt as he looked at the two, thinking about what he had done while the whole alliance was still inside the hall. Fortunately, the two were understanding, with Fenrir replying, “Nothing to worry about, Master. You wanted to make the job of teleportation easier, thinking that it would be easier to just keep us two in the system in the chance you needed us.”

Hearing Fenrir’s response, Aurus radiated an aura that was akin to being cared for. A few seconds later, Charisa looked around the surroundings with her field of vision, noticing that they were outside the alliance base. With this in mind, Charisa looked at Aurus and asked, “Master, why are we here? And why did you summon us?”

“We’re finally going to attack the opposing army,” Aurus said as he radiated an aura of excitement. Not long after, he looked at the two of them and said, “Since the other alliance members are at the back of the alliance base, it’ll take a while for them to arrive near Chonk’s army. In other words, we’ll be the first few Inanimates to come close to Chonk and have a bout with them.”

He then took a look through the soul balls and noticed that they stopped retreating, stopping at an area that was only a few meters away from the territory they resided at. From the looks of it, it seemed that they were going to finally finish the second phase, prompting Aurus to say to both Fenrir and Charisa, “Of course, we can’t just come there without being as menacing as possible, right?”

“Let’s activate the Ignis Zephyr Anima Form. As for the move we’ll use, we’ll think about that later.”

With their master telling them that they were going to do a fusion attack again, Fenrir and Charisa radiated auras of excitement and happiness as they positioned themselves accordingly. Seeing that they were eager to do a fusion attack as well, Aurus radiated a slightly intensified aura of excitement as he shouted, “Activate your aura skills!”

“Let’s surprise Chonk’s army!”

…

On the other hand, Chonk and the army radiated auras of slight fear, with Chonk radiating the most intense aura of fear amongst them. Although it was just a single move, the thing broken was still the culmination of the energy of three beings that were at the existence level beyond an Inanimate. He could not help but wonder if the alliance they were fighting against had a few connections to some strong Animates, making Chonk slightly regret the fact that he wanted to wage war with such an alliance.

Nevertheless, what’s done is done and all he could now was to make sure that this strong Animate did not interfere with his army while fighting against the Tempest Branch Alliance. Thinking that the distance between the alliance base and the army was sufficient, Chonk let out a sigh of relief as the state of his mind gradually turned better. He then turned around to look at his army and said, “Let’s continue where we left off.”

“Start the final part of the second phase!”

Whoosh! Whoosh!

And just like that, all of the Inanimates in Chonk’s army started charging their strongest skills one more time, shooting them towards a certain place in mid-air over Chonk’s head. With all of the beams shot out by the Inanimates converging in one place, Horell and Chungus followed up with their own strongest skills as well, shooting out beams of their own towards where the beams converged, transforming the energy that condensed in that certain spot into the shape of a double-helix.

As usual, Chonk went ahead and destroyed this double-helix with his front paw, allowing the particles that made up this double-helix to spread throughout the surroundings as the aura of the army intensified by a notch. A few seconds later, Chonk circulated the energy inside his body and then spread it out towards the surroundings, solidifying the aura that every member had.

“[Imperium Orbis: Tenfold Power]!” Shouting this phrase, Chonk let out a long sigh of relief, thinking that the gap of strength between his army and the Tempest Branch Alliance had lessened, even if it may be just a little bit. Just as stated before by him, before starting the third phase of Code Omega, he decided to begin Code Beta first, sending a strand of energy towards Chungus with the message, “Chungus, can you go to the magic circle you made and wait for my signal? Code Beta is just a fancy name I made up for the Grand Restriction spell you have.”

“Ah?” Although the request was sudden, Chungus decided that it would probably be better for him to stay away from the war anyway. Even though he was hired by Chonk to fight in this war, he would rather stay safe from harm rather than be riddled with wounds all over. “Alright, then. Just send a strand of energy once you want me to activate the spell, okay?”

“Mhm.” And with that, after Chonk acceded to Chungus’s request, Chungus then turned around and started hopping to where the magic circle he made was. A few minutes had passed by with nothing happening, making Chonk think that the alliance was probably going to give up in the war until…

“And I thought we would arrive here before they could finish powering up.” A decent distance away from Chonk’s army, a voice started speaking, which made Chonk look at the direction of this voice. He could not help but radiate an aura of killing intent as he looked at the three Inanimates that were gradually getting closer to where his army was.

“Hoh? A few members of the Tempest Branch Alliance deciding to come closer on their own accord? I must applaud you for your bravery.” At the instant the three Inanimates had arrived in front of Chonk’s army, Chonk could not help but radiate a haughty aura as he spoke in a slightly cold manner. Surprisingly, although he spoke in this manner, the feeling he had inwardly was vastly different from his exterior.

‘What the heck? The aura they’re radiating far surpasses the aura the Inanimates of my army are radiating! Now that I think about it, the aura they’re radiating is extremely close to intensity to Horell’s! Is this the trump card of the alliance?’

“Why applaud us for our bravery?” In response to Chonk’s words, a glowing wooden sculpture replied to his statement, lightly chuckling as it added, “Don’t you think you should be mad at us for having your six division leaders die from your paws? Oh wait, it was just five.”

Listening to one of the Inanimates’ response, Chonk could not help but grit his teeth in anger, coldly laughing as he shouted, “Oh? So you three were the ones who forced me to kill myself important members of my army?”

“Nah.” In response, the glowing wooden sculpture moved forward by a bit. It then responded, “That was all me.”

In that instant, the expression on Chonk’s face, as well as the emotion he was feeling inside had become similar.

Immense rage.

“Why you…!” Just as Chonk was about to hit the glowing wooden sculpture with his front paw, an aura that slightly exceeded the aura radiated by the three Inanimates could not help but make him stop in place, looking at where the new aura had come from. At the moment he looked, he said, “Are you going to stop me, Herellia?”

In front of his field of vision was a branch covered to the brim with red carvings, radiating an aura that did not lose to the auras radiated by the three Inanimates that had come before her. Of course, this was none other than Herellia. She responded to Chonk’s question, saying, “I have all reasons to. He’s the vice leader of my alliance, after all.”

After that, she looked at the glowing wooden sculpture with an aura of immense confidence before saying, “Aurus, since you’ve shown me your full power. How about I show you the full power of the alliance?”

“[Forbidden Sanguine Arts]…”

“[Crimson Spirit Incarnation]!”

Whoosh! Whoosh!

In that instant, the aura radiated by Herellia had intensified by tens of times in an instant, dwarfing the auras radiated by Aurus, Fenrir, and Charisa, who were the three Inanimates that came before her. A few seconds later, the aura that surrounded Herellia took on a crimson shade as her body gradually morphed into a humanoid shape.

In response to this occurrence, Aurus only had one thing to say.

“Omg.”

…

While the war of Tempest Cliff was occurring, a rift had abruptly opened up in the boundary of the Tempest Cliff.

Whoosh!

Not long after, a mosquito the size of a large spider had exited this rift, looking at its surroundings with a curious yet confused expression. After looking around its surroundings, it could not help but mutter to itself, “Eh? This place doesn’t really suit the feeling of a cultivator’s inheritance. Is this seriously the inheritance of that secluded cultivator?”

Just as he was about to go ahead and wander around the whole Tempest Cliff, its senses could not help but pick up multiple faint yet intense auras clashing with another, making it radiate an aura of curiosity as it started flapping its wings towards the auras.

“Is this seriously the place of a cultivator’s inheritance? From the auras I’m feeling, I feel like that isn’t the case.”

“Nevertheless, it’s kind of exciting.”