Chapter 51: Psychics Guarding Each Other

Hessen brought his palms together and rubbed them. When he opened them, each hand was already grasping a battle blade forged of solid flame and a whip crackling with concentrated lightning, respectively. A nearly transparent aura rippled across his body, quickly forming a layer of metallic-sheened, greenish-black scales over his natural armor.

This was a remarkably wondrous and extraordinary spectacle. Under normal circumstances, if the High Elder were to put on such a display, ordinary sandfolk would have long since dropped to their knees in pilgrimage. Even those ill-intentioned lord chieftains would have had no choice but to swallow their envy, jealousy, and hatred, offering respectful obeisance with proper decorum. At this moment, however, the sandfolk had completely lost their will to fight. They were entirely incapable of discerning whether the flames and lightning before them originated from enemy gunfire or had been conjured by the High Elder; they only knew to surrender themselves to the blind dictates of their survival instincts.

This time, High Elder Hessen made no further attempt to rally the fleeing soldiers. He merely took a stride forward and lashed out with his lightning whip toward the mobile armored infantry closing in on him.

Now that humanity had entered the cosmic era, standard terrestrial powered armor naturally could not lack anti-electrical shielding devices. Yet, the lightning forged from psionic energy was not generated by nature; it was one of those exceedingly rare forces capable of inflicting systemic disruption on the vast majority of artificial protective devices.

High Elder Hessen possessed profound confidence in his own power. Back when he had just unlocked his third astrolabe, he had once used a full-strength lightning strike to pull a heavy airship out of the sky—and that was no transport craft utilized by Earth's garrison forces, but a legitimate, hundred-ton low-altitude heavy firepower support gunship whose onboard arsenal was fully capable of utterly flattening a million-strong metropolis. Piercing the combat armor of a mobile infantryman was thus an utterly effortless task.

The lightning-forged whip swept across the low altitude, tracing a clawing, incandescent trajectory. Suddenly, a screen of light unfolded and intercepted the path of the lightning whip. A teeth-grunting sequence of crackling collisions rang out; the light screen dissolved directly, but the lightning was deflected away, crashing violently into the ground below.

Hessen felt as though he had nearly lost his balance, only managing to steady himself with great difficulty before hearing an angry roar from his side: "None of you interfere, he is mine!"

The High Elder felt his dignity as a third-ring Awakened being being trampled upon. Just as he was about to erupt in fury, another voice chimed in from the opposite side: "Right, right, right, he's all his! Let's just wait until he beats the guy half-to-death and then we'll swoop in for the kill!"

Immediately following this, a string of Coalition curses that he could not understand erupted beside him. Accompanying the profanity was a beam of brilliant blue light that suddenly blazed into existence.

"A lightsight!" A chill ran down the High Elder's spine as he felt his entire body surge as if struck by a current, every single scale seemingly paralyzed. Instinctively, he crossed the flame blade in his right hand to parry the beam thrusting toward his flank.

The instant the beam of light and the blazing fire met, deep blue and incandescent red merged into one. The distortion of light and energy forged a blindingly bright sphere of radiance at their intersection, completely obscuring their original forms. A muffled, oppressive humming vibration—sounding akin to the buzzing of mosquitoes amplified several dozenfold—vibrated through the air.

This was a lightsaber—a weapon crafted with Beren crystal, one of the rare zero-elements commonly known as energy-focusing crystal, serving as its core. The user's psionic energy stimulated the focusing crystal to generate high-temperature plasma, which was then condensed into an energy beam via a magnetic field generated by mechanical devices.

This plasma beam, resembling a literal blade of light, simultaneously possessed properties of being indestructible and capable of destroying anything. The condensed energy beam infused with psionic energy could slice through or even melt the sturdiest alloy armor, and naturally, it could neutralize and shatter energy shields. By the same token, since the lightsaber blade possessed psionic attributes, it was equally capable of blocking, countering, and even suppressing psionic arts.

Consequently, the fiery slash that could easily have torn through the armor of a battle tank or even a destroyer was thus intercepted mid-air. The incandescent sphere of radiance abruptly raised the surrounding temperature by several degrees, scorching the High Elder's scales until they began to grow searingly hot. Yet, his heart grew deathly cold.

He truly had not anticipated encountering an adversary wielding a lightsaber here.

One had to know that this weapon was originally developed by the Coalition as exclusive standard-issue equipment for Pathfinders and executive officers of the Paranormal Bureau, rendering it exceedingly precious—though over recent years, quite a few had leaked out through various channels, thus becoming one of the Empire's favorite talking points when mocking the Coalition as a bunch of "egalitarian rabble." Still, the pot needn't call the kettle black, as a fair number of Astral Knights' atomic light-spears could likewise be found on the black market.

Why isn't that mine? Such an elegant, cold, yet powerful weapon—how perfectly suited it was for him! The High Elder desperately wanted to feel envious, but he didn't even have the luxury to entertain such an emotion now, for his opponent's blade had already deftly parried the flames and thrust toward his side.

Hessen hastily manifested a metallic coating of psionic energy over his body while evasively utilizing the wind to dodge backward, barely managing to evade a fatal strike. Even so, he was grazed by the searing edge of the blade, feeling as though his waist had been seared by hot tongs, his scales charring black.

Hessen was beyond furious. He threw open his arms, and the flame blade and lightning whip in his hands instantly vanished, transforming instead into a gale of wind blades centered entirely upon himself.

The frantic tempest turned a ten-meter radius around him into a zone of absolute death, grinding rocks and sand into its vortex and casting an even darker shadow over the roaring storm.

Within the storm, the buzzing reverberations of a disturbed spatial field sounded several times over, followed by a phantom shadow being violently repelled. The figure shifted from illusory to solid before ungracefully landing flat on his backside.

Naturally, this was Ash Stein, who had graduated from the Pathfinder training camp only to ultimately bypass that upright and righteous career path in favor of becoming a mere free mercenary. Presently, summoned (and threatened) by a certain military officer of the Commonwealth, he was participating in this Battle of Turon.

If his current state were known to his former classmates at the training camp, he would undoubtedly be regarded as the "disgrace of the (candidate) pathfinders."

This "disgrace of the pathfinders" rubbed his rear end, cast a lingering glance of apprehension at the trench coat now shredded into dozens of massive rents, and hardened his heart, tearing the utterly ruined garment completely open and discarding it onto the ground to reveal his pitch-black inner armor.

The inner armor already bore shocking scratches, dents, and cleaving scars. Just a fraction of an inch deeper, and it would have directly breached his flesh.

Ash wore an expression of profound heartache, resembling a collector whose newly acquired limited-edition figurine had been disassembled as building blocks by a visiting relative's unruly child.

Yu Lian knew that this was a Coalition-manufactured Iron Rock defense vest, capable of resisting stabs, bullets, impacts, and energy strikes. While it provided the wearer with no powered propulsion, its defensive capabilities were genuinely stellar—outperforming the alloy armor of the vast majority of powered exoskeletons while remaining lightweight, form-fitting, and easily concealable. Just last year, it had even been selected as one of the top ten stellar defensive gears of the galaxy by the magazine *Free Cuirassier*.

Since Ash was by no means a figure of prominent official standing, acquiring such an item must have cost him considerable effort.

Looking at the fragments of his coat on the ground, the free mercenary let out a wail mournful enough to move the unfeeling and make the stoic weep: "A tragedy! This was a Malensan windbreaker! The exact matching model worn by the protagonist in *Wing of Conviction*! I finally managed to get my hands on it during a promotional event, and it cost me two thousand credit-stars!"

So you're agonizing over this junk?

"How about it? Do you still not need our intervention?" Yu Lian chuckled.

The mercenary wiped away a tear, gritting his teeth as he spoke, "Intervene! Intervene now! This fellow can condense psionic energy into natural attributes; he's either a zealot or a cultist. Though his ring rank is indeed higher than ours, he is precisely my kind of prey! You provide support, and I'll take the lead in the offensive! But none of the others are to make a move either."

Yu Lian nodded, lifting his chainsword and slowly closing in on the storm from a different angle.

He knew that, just as Ash had stated, the astrolabe Hessen had activated was the rainbow-colored "Command" astrolabe, and the title of its first ring was precisely "Zealot." As the name suggested, these Awakened ones zealously pursued the most direct and explicit manifestations of psionic power, devoting their entire psyche to shaping psionic attributes—bearing quite a few similarities to the wizards found in fantasy worldviews.

In truth, the third ring he himself currently occupied also bore the title of "Wizard."

The ultimate destination of this astrolabe path was known as the "Firmament Mentor"—yes, the very realm Yu Lian had previously sought to attain. Doesn't that sound like a title tailor-made for an invincible archmage?

Of course, as we all know, archmages—especially those still in training—tend to be proficient against hordes of fodder yet weak against bosses. Hessen was a "Wizard," and for all he knew, had already mastered abilities akin to deflection shields. If ordinary soldiers opened fire on him at this range, even assuming they genuinely managed to strike him down, God only knew how many would perish from the ricocheting bullets alone.

Psionic users could only be dealt with by psionic users! Though Yu Lian scoffed inwardly at this notion, it truly was the prevailing consensus among most people. At least under the current circumstances, the two of them were the only ones who could take the field.

"According to the *Principle of Psionic and Zero-Element Conversion* and the *Awakened Vigil Watch Covenant*, the fewer people who make a move, the smaller the number of people sharing the loot! Therefore, just the two of us will suffice!"

At this point, Stein's cheeks were twitching as he cast a sideways glance at Yu Lian, wearing an expression that practically screamed, *"I've already made massive compromises, so don't you dare push your luck."*

So it was because of that!

The so-called "Principle of Psionic and Zero-Element Conversion" dictated that the corpses of fallen Awakened ones invariably generated rare zero-elements. Scholars had consequently proposed the "Conservation Theorem of Psionics and Zero-Elements." However, because the scale—measured in galaxies or even the universe—was simply far too immense to calculate or quantify, the theory remained nothing more than a hypothesis.

As for the *Awakened Vigil Watch Covenant*, it was an international treaty spearheaded by the Void Sanctuary—an "Awakened Mutual Aid Organization" transcending the major galactic polities—and promoted through the Galactic Civilization Parliament. Its core tenet was that Awakened ones were the pillars of civilized society and the elite of intelligent life; thus, while they were inevitably forced to kill one another due to unavoidable reality, they must still be accorded due respect. Any individual or organization slaying an Awakened had the right to harvest the zero-elements produced from their remains, yet strictly prohibited from intentionally desecrating or damaging the corpse, while bearing the obligation to lay them to rest, erect a tombstone, and hold a proper funeral.

...Though the first half of the sentence was clearly what mattered more than the second. Put bluntly, according to this covenant, the fewer people who participated in the fight, the fewer people looting the corpse, and consequently, the larger the share each individual would receive.

That was the real reason Ash didn't want anyone else to intervene.

You're going to die because of this obsession sooner or later! It was like that in the past life, and it's like this in the present one! Yu Lian couldn't help rolling his eyes, concluding that it would probably be wisest to wait until Hessen beat this fellow half to death before stepping in.