The battle continued for several minutes. Their blades met over and over, each clash ringing out across the terrain.

The spirit fought with heart and experience. Clearly having a lifetime worth of hunting experience, and sword work.

Every strike was efficient, every dodge minimal, every counter aimed at his vital points.

But Moon matched it all.

His smile only widened as the minutes passed. His footwork kept pace with the spirit’s speed. His blade found the parries it needed to find. His body moved with the instinct he had sharpened through hundreds of fights over the past days.

"Not bad." Moon said between exchanges, deflecting a thrust aimed at his throat. "I can hold my ground against a weak Second Star spirit in close combat. Without using my main skills."

The spirit’s expression darkened. Its expression tightened, and the tempo of its attacks increased.

Each swing was faster, harder, carrying more force than the last.

Moon was humiliating it. And it knew.

"You dare act so high and mighty?" The spirit snarled, its blade following an arc that forced Moon to step back. "Show your true strength then!"

Moon’s lips curled upward.

"You asked for it."

Lightning crackled in his left hand. Even as his right hand continued to parry the spirit’s strikes, purple energy gathered in his palm. The Raiju began to show its terrifying presence with flashes of crackling purple.

The spirit’s eyes widened, staring at the Raiju. ’That’s a powerful attack. He’s casting it while fighting me simultaneously?!’

It pressed harder, throwing everything it had into breaking Moon’s guard before the spell was complete. A flurry of strikes rained down from every angle. Overhead, lateral, thrust, feint, thrust again.

Moon answered every single one. Not because of pure skill, but because of the strength differential too. Although he was less experienced than the spirit when it came to swordsmanship, Moon’s passive buffs, high attributes, and miscellaneous skills like [Air Step], made him a very slippery opponent that was very difficult to keep hold of, or injure badly.

The spirit couldn’t disrupt the casting. It couldn’t close the gap fast enough to stop what was coming.

"You can die now."

The Raiju exploded from Moon’s hand. The purple wolf leapt forward, crossing the short distance before the spirit could blink.

The spirit tried to make distance. It pushed off the ground and threw itself backward, its blade swinging upward to intercept the wolf mid-flight.

The wolf swerved at the last moment. It changed trajectory so sharply it seemed to fold through the air, dodging the sword strike entirely, and struck the spirit directly in the face.

One moment, the diamond on its forehead was glowing faintly.

The next, there was no head at all.

The spirit’s body stood upright for a brief second, its sword still raised in the position of its final swing. Then it crumpled to the ground.

[You have killed the Level 38 2-Star Spirit]

[You have gained 90 Lives]

Moon smiled as the spiritual energy flooded into his body. It wasn’t enough to fill his fourth acupoint entirely, but the density was incomparable to anything a beast could provide. A single spirit kill was worth more than dozens of beast kills in spiritual energy alone.

Mirage’s eye glowed purple. The doppelganger split from his body, and Moon worked quickly. He cut open the spirit’s chest, removed the spiritual core, and placed the headless body across the clone’s back.

A gentle nudge and the doppelganger took off, carrying the corpse away from the kill site at full gallop, heading in the direction Moon commanded it.

Moon leapt onto the real Mirage. "Let’s go."

They rode hard, putting distance between themselves and the scene.

◇◇◇◇

Inside the pavilion, the news arrived almost instantly.

One of their own had fallen, yet again.

Not to mention, it wasn’t just any one of them. It was an elder!

A spirit who had hunted the island’s most dangerous creatures alongside the pavilion master during his early years.

What made things worse...the elder died just a few kilometers away from the pavilion.

Anger spread through the castle like a tremor through stone. Spirits gathered in the main hall, their voices overlapping, their auras flaring, furious.

"First the young ones. Now an elder."

"The perpetrators are growing bolder by the day."

The spirits couldn’t believe that a single creature had killed off an elder of theirs. Specially on this island, the elder was considered to be at least in the top 20 strongest spirits within the pavilion, and its death could only mean it was ambushed by several.

"They are mocking us! Killing at our doorstep and fleeing before we can respond."

A group of powerful spirits stepped forward.

Five of them. Two Star elders, each one radiating an aura that pressed down on every younger spirit in the hall.

Their expressions were carved from cold stone.

Several younger spirits moved to join them, eager for blood, but were stopped by a raised hand from the lead elder.

"Not all of us can leave. If this is a provocation designed to draw us out, the pavilion must remain defended. We were instructed by the pavilion master to leave, nobody else shall leave. Anybody who does so, will be punished by us once we return. Is that understood?!"

The younger spirits clenched their fists but nodded. They understood.

The five elders moved toward the gate.

"I can feel the body." One of them said, its pale eyes narrowing as it focused on something beyond the walls. "It’s moving. Someone is carrying it away."

"Most likely the horse that always disappears..."

"Then we follow it. We move fast. If the killer is still nearby, we end this today."

The others nodded, and the group surged through the gates, their speed carrying them across the rocky terrain like shadows cast by a passing cloud.

Ten minutes later, the five elders caught up to the horse.

The lead spirit didn’t hesitate. Its blade flashed and the doppelganger dissolved into thin purple smoke, vanishing the same way every phantom creature did.

Before the spirit’s body could hit the ground, one of the elders caught it, cradling the headless corpse in both arms.

The group gathered around. Five faces stared down at someone they had known since young. The silence between them was heavy, filled with grief and sorrow.

"Damn it." One of them spoke first, his voice low and trembling. "The perpetrators are using the same trick as before. You shouldn’t have killed that horse. We could have taken it to the pavilion master. He might have had a way to trace its origin."

The spirit holding the body looked up. "You think they would have let us do that? The horse would have dissolved on its own like it always does."

The other spirit’s eyes swept the surrounding terrain, "Let’s search the area. There must be someone nearby!"

The others nodded.

"I will wait here with the body." The spirit cradling their fallen friend said quietly. "If you find anyone, break down a tree to notify us. There are plenty." He continued, looking at the dense tree-line.

"Remain within earshot of each other."

The four spirits split and vanished into the forest in different directions. Their speed made them nearly invisible between the trees, pale blurs weaving through the undergrowth.

Seconds had barely passed when one of the spirits heard clash of metal against claws. A beast crying out in pain. The unmistakable sounds of combat, close, just beyond the next ridge.

It sprinted toward the noise and found a clearing. What it found was a human fighting a beast, sword in hand.