After confirming that Number Fifteen from the Heaven List was completely dead, Elara finally let out a long breath of relief. This was the most satisfying and also the most dangerous fight she had experienced since arriving in this world. Whether it was calculating the opponent's poisoning or analyzing the shift in their combat psychology, every move and step kept her focused and excited.
To defeat an opponent whose overall strength was nearly double hers, Elara had already prepared herself for serious injury. But the result was far better than she had expected. Elara lifted her hand to wipe the sweat from her forehead, smoothed her slightly messy hair from the fierce battle, and sent several brilliantly colored venomous snakes forward again to confirm Number Fifteen's death.
After the snakes came back with confirmation, she also finished tidying herself up and began to clean the battlefield, collecting everything on Number Fifteen. At that moment, Uno's side let out a final earth-shaking roar. The battle between Uno and Number Nine and Number Seven from the Heaven List was far more intense and ferocious than hers.
Not only did Number Nine and Number Seven have even deeper and more overwhelming power than Number Fifteen, but they also each had their own unique deadly techniques. Unfortunately, when facing Uno, who like Elara now was immune to all poisons and had internal strength as vast as the sea, those techniques were almost useless. On top of that, Uno was provoked by Elara's injuries.
Even though she had used the Holy Spirit's Blood to calm him down, his actions still carried a violent edge. So just as Elara ended her fight, he immediately killed Number Nine and Number Seven, then instantly appeared by her side.
"Master..." Still stained with blood from the battle, Uno knelt on one knee in front of her, his eyes locked on the wounds on her body. His lips were tightly pressed, and the hand holding the dagger was so tense it looked like it would bend the blade.
"I'm fine. Don't worry. Wasn't it me who ordered you not to interfere earlier?" No matter how she got injured, even if she deliberately let herself get hurt, Uno always blamed himself when he saw her wounds. Elara couldn't bear to see him trapped in that emotional spiral.
She bent down to pull him up. Seeing that his whole body was still tense and his gaze stuck on her wounds, she simply wrapped her arms around his waist and held him for a while to comfort him. "It's okay now. These are just surface injuries, and they've already started to scab. You should be able to feel it too, I'm not in any pain at all."
"I intended to use this battle to temper myself anyway. These small wounds aren't a bad thing, and it's definitely not your fault, so don't blame yourself." This fight had allowed Elara to clearly recognize the current limits of her strength. Although the mechanisms from the Heavenly Craft Pavilion and the medicine from Oswyn were incredibly effective, and her Puppet Soldiers were also strong enough to help her significantly in critical moments, she still decided that from now on, whether she returned to Plumera or not, she would carve out time each day to have Uno continue guiding her in cultivating the Divine Spirit Technique.
The level of this technique was extremely high. She had only cultivated it to the sixth layer and could already match the mid to upper tier of top experts on the continent. The internal force developed through the Divine Spirit Technique was far more condensed and powerful than that of other methods.
This was also why, at the start of the battle, she was able to barely withstand the attacks of Number Fifteen, even though her strength was much lower. No matter how good external tools were, they were still just that, external. Elara would continue to carry many hidden weapons and pills refined by Oswyn, but beyond that, what she wanted most was to increase her own internal strength.
Only by enhancing her personal strength could she handle stronger opponents with ease in the future. Then she wouldn't have to fight in such a desperate state like this time. Number Fifteen from the Blood Garment Tower might already count as a top-tier expert in the world, but at most, he was only among the upper-middle tier.
Take Number Nine and Number Seven, who fought Uno. As long as either of them had faced Elara alone, even if she used every trick she had, her chances of winning would still be extremely low. And across the continent, there were many masters hidden in the shadows who were even stronger than those two.
If she ran into any of them in the future, Elara's own strength would need to improve by several levels to have any chance of winning, even with all her methods. Uno, held in her arms, finally seemed to come back to himself a little, but his expression still looked gloomy.
Elara looked at his face and couldn't help reaching out to pinch his cheek. She wrapped her arm around his neck, pulling him down toward her, then lifted her face and gently touched his cheek with her lips. "I said I'm fine. Did you hear me?"
Uno froze. The effect was immediate.
The moment her lips moved away, all the guilt and gloom on Uno's face disappeared! He suddenly looked dazed, like he had frozen, standing stiffly in place like a wooden post.
Seeing his big reaction, Elara remembered that she probably had never kissed him before.
She couldn't help but smile, reaching out to pinch this extremely loyal and extremely inexperienced man again. She didn't disturb his stiff posture. She just waited patiently for him to come back to his senses while circling him to check for injuries.
Once she confirmed that he only had a few minor wounds, she relaxed, took out a pill, and shoved it into his mouth to make him swallow it.
After feeding him the medicine, Elara didn't bother with him anymore. She turned to the corpses of Tianzi Fifteen, Tianzi Nine, and Tianzi Seven and began to thoroughly loot them.
These three were among the top experts of the Blood Cloak Tower, especially Tianzi Nine and Tianzi Seven.
From their combat strength, Elara could roughly guess the level of the Tianzi Top Three, who were guarding the Divine Mirror and who she would soon have to deal with.
Even if Uno could take on one of them, there were still two more she had to handle.
Even though her goal wasn't to kill the Tianzi Top Three from Blood Cloak Tower, but to force the Emperor of Jingshi to use the Divine Mirror while on the brink of death.
But since those three took turns guarding the mirror, there was a high chance she would have to face them directly.
And their strength far exceeded that of Tianzi Nine and Tianzi Seven.
With that in mind, Elara became even more determined to have Uno train her in the "Divine Spirit Mystic Art" every day once they got back.
If necessary, Elara even considered using national luck points to get the System to give her a buff like "double learning speed," to raise her combat power as much as possible before going to Jingshi.
After all, the recent movements from Jingshi and its subordinate nations made it clear that soon after the Hundred Nations Banquet ended, they would strike at Plumera and Dahlia.
Elara didn't want to be threatened by that mirror, so she had to act before they did. Otherwise, if her or Prince Yu's image appeared in that mirror, they would be doomed.
While organizing her next steps, Elara had already stripped everything useful from the three Tianzi assassins.
Aside from some gold, silver, healing medicines, and random items, she really did find some good stuff.
Tianzi Nine and Seven were in the top ten of Blood Cloak Tower. They were elite killers who had access to the organization's inner circle and all sorts of classified information.
After searching their bodies for a while, Elara not only found a map showing Blood Cloak Tower's branches around the world, but even discovered a thick stack of extremely confidential assassination transaction records between the tower and major national powers.
Elara stared at the stack of assassination records in a daze for two seconds. Her first reaction was that these top-ranking assassins were definitely in the middle of other secret missions.
Otherwise, it would be impossible for them to carry such highly sensitive documents on their persons.
Even leaking one or two of those pages could bring Blood Cloak Tower massive trouble.
Thinking that, Elara picked up the map of Blood Cloak Tower's global branches first and had the System mark the locations on the world map.
Then she pulled out the thick assassination transaction record, carefully wrapped in silk and parchment, and examined it closely.
Every name written there was someone from various countries who had been assassinated by Blood Cloak Tower over the years. Under each name, there was also the name of the involved country or force and a brief reason for the assassination.
Elara scanned through it and found that many major figures from third-tier, second-tier, and even first-tier nations had been targeted.
The deeper she read, the more she smiled.
This assassination list was even more confidential and important than she had first imagined.
It not only gave her tons of hidden intel about different countries that she normally wouldn't have had access to, but also shocking secrets. For example, the emperor of a second-tier nation in the central continent once hired Blood Cloak Tower to kill the only child of a powerful general he feared might grow too influential.
Or how a branch family in a second-tier force had used the tower to eliminate the young master of their sect just to seize the sect leader's position.
Or even how a noblewoman from a powerful faction had slaughtered every other branch of her husband's family to secure a future for her own children.