Huang Qing believed that Xu Fengnian’s strength could easily shatter a single bolt of heavenly lightning, yet he absolutely refused to believe that Xu Fengnian could bear punishment on another’s behalf. It was like in a royal court, when the furious empress of Beiman decreed someone’s death; no matter how peerless your martial arts might be, like Tuoba Pusa’s, no one could overturn the emperor’s will. This had nothing to do with one’s cultivation level; the heavenly Dao followed its own immutable rules. Yet the scene unfolding before him left Huang Qing no choice but to believe, for it utterly surpassed the imagination of even the most elite sword cultivators of Beiman. After the Copper Sage Ancestor invoked his hundreds-of-zhang-tall celestial general dharma body, its majestic form towering over all beings with its head level to the black clouds, the Sage himself approached Huang Qing. The wound from the blade through his chest showed no sign of bleeding. Calmly, this deeply hidden fallen immortal explained, “This youth foresaw that Xu Longxiang would inevitably break through his cultivation barrier, and had already laid hidden groundwork. However, I do not know by what secret technique he has transferred Longxiang’s fate onto himself. Such a method of reversing the Dao can only invite further heavenly retribution.”
Huang Qing’s mind sparked with realization, and he sighed, “It must be that reawakened Fujiang Hongjia armor. Otherwise, considering Xu Longxiang’s Born with Indestructible Might (innate King Kong physique), adding such armor would be like drawing legs on a snake—unnecessary embellishment. Initially, I thought it was some ancient mystical art from the Daoist holy mountain Longhu, meant to suppress Longxiang’s cultivation advancement. Now I realize I underestimated Xu Fengnian’s cunning. Earlier, I heard by chance of a technique from Lüzu of Wudang, the ‘Cup Reversing the Sea.’ If I’m not mistaken, that armor is the cup, meant to channel Xu Longxiang’s fate.”
The Copper Sage Ancestor, his aura surging, pondered for a moment and nodded. “You’re not far off.”
The Sage, who had calculated every possible angle, had never anticipated that the young man’s first move would be his left-handed blade, which sent him crashing directly into this battlefield. That strike, clean and decisive, carried a mystical resonance akin to the arcane techniques used a century ago by an unnamed Daoist immortal to seal the demon E Songtao. Even the Copper Sage could only retreat repeatedly, powerless to resist. Had Xu Fengnian aimed to kill rather than deliberately drawing his blade, the Sage might not even have managed to summon his celestial general dharma body before perishing.
In the Sage’s eyes, Xu Longxiang had finally broken into the Tianxiang realm in a rage, surrounded by the aura of a malevolent dragon. At this moment, Huang Qing would likely be no match at all, and even his dharma body might not be able to subdue the youth.
The Copper Sage said calmly, “Huang Qing, retreat for now. The heavenly tribulation is about to descend. There’s no need for you to perish alongside me.”
Huang Qing replied bitterly, “Master, if I retreat now, I will be unworthy of the sword in my hand, and I will never again have the chance to ascend to the peak of sword cultivation.”
He knew full well that whether or not Xu Longxiang could withstand the tribulation was uncertain, but the enraged youth would certainly have more than enough strength to crush him.
Huang Qing glanced down at his famed sword, Ding Bo Feng, exhaled a heavy breath, and a determined smile crossed his face. He raised his head, gripped his blade tightly, and took a step forward. “Sailing upstream, to not advance is to retreat! Perhaps today is the very moment I break through to the realm of a sword immortal.”
The Copper Sage murmured softly, “My intuition tells me today will be full of twists and turns. That’s fine if you choose not to retreat. Watch those two brothers for me while I stoke the cauldron above my head, severing Xu Longxiang’s last thread of hope.”
As the Copper Sage slowly raised his hand beside Huang Qing, the celestial general dharma body towering above also lifted its arms. With a sudden clap of its palms, golden ripples burst outward in successive waves, the echoes lingering.
It seemed as if something was being born between its palms.
Huang Qing raised his sword before him and began to gather momentum.
Far away, another strange phenomenon erupted. Xu Fengnian’s hand, pressed upon Xu Longxiang’s head, stirred red threads like hundreds of slender crimson snakes flicking their tongues, frantically drawing out the seven or eight black dragon auras surrounding Longxiang.
Those red threads had once been the ultimate secret art of the Human Cat, Han Diaosi—the technique that could slay a Tianxiang-level opponent with a single finger.
Now, Xu Fengnian used them to “steal” his younger brother’s Tianxiang cultivation.
The heavenly lightning rolled like boulders across clouds dark as black silk, growing even more intense.
Thunder roared, purple lightning crisscrossed the sky, as if countless celestial immortals were shouting in fury above.
When a common man rages, blood stains five paces. When an emperor rages, a million corpses fall.
Then how fearsome must be the wrath of immortals from the Ninth Heaven?
Xu Fengnian withdrew his hand and gently pushed Xu Longxiang, who could no longer move, sending his younger brother, Huang Man’er, flying several miles away.
Xu Fengnian gazed at the sky. The purple lightning danced among the clouds like a school of dragons weaving through the sea.
He gripped the Beiliang blade, looked upward, and smiled faintly to himself. “Xu Xiao, do you remember that scene? Did it not resemble a dragon robe?”
For the first time in his life, Huang Qing felt reverence for someone. There were rumors that Wang Xianzhi once possessed the magnanimity to stand alone against the entire world, his masterly aura surpassing even the other nine martial experts.
At this moment, Xu Fengnian, facing the heavenly tribulation alone, also exuded a presence as if he stood alone against an entire nation.
Huang Qing closed his eyes. His entire life of sword wielding and training flashed before him like a passing parade.
After his “Rules” sword failed and his inner cultivation was damaged—nearly causing his cultivation to collapse after reaching the brink of success—witnessing Xu Fengnian standing firm with his blade gave him a new insight. Like a stone from another mountain used to polish one’s own jade, he seized the opportunity to touch the threshold of a terrestrial immortal. His previously unstable cultivation stage, now shaken, instead became stable and rose steadily.
Huang Qing opened his eyes, his expression solemn. “I shall await the falling lightning to forge my new sword. Then, with this newly realized sword immortal strike, I shall pay my respects to you, the King of Beiliang.”
Lightning cracked, the sky seemed to tear open a hole.
The second bolt of purple lightning roared down!
It did not strike directly atop Xu Fengnian’s head, but instead landed dozens of zhang away from the young Beiliang King, then turned and shot toward him.
Its momentum was like the charge of ten thousand armored cavalry.
Xu Fengnian slightly crouched, his right hand fingers together, his left hand blade pointing directly at the purple lightning.
He growled, “Sever the River!”
The purple lightning surged like a tidal wave, but Xu Fengnian cleaved it in two with a single slash.
The purple torrent split in half, rushing past him on either side before dissipating into the void.
As if a celestial immortal in the heavens shouted in fury, “A mere mortal dares defy the heavenly Dao?!”
Then came the third bolt, even thicker and fiercer, rushing down to the mortal world.
Xu Fengnian plunged his blade into the earth beside him, took a stance.
He stepped forward with one foot, raised both hands, and traced a half-circle.
He summoned the move: “Shaking Mount Kunlun!”
With a single palm strike, he forcibly lifted the purple lightning.
Heaven, clouds, and lightning all came crashing down, and the earth itself seemed to sink. Xu Fengnian stood at the bottom of a crater over ten zhang deep. To Huang Qing, it seemed as though the purple lightning had exploded in dazzling brilliance, scattering like water spilling from a shattered vat across the land.
When Xu Fengnian retrieved his Beiliang blade and stepped out of the massive crater,
The fourth and most magnificent bolt of purple lightning broke through the lower clouds and suddenly splintered into thousands of thinner bolts, each no thicker than an arm, chaotically piercing toward Xu Fengnian.
The heavenly net was vast.
Enemies on all sides, thunder from eight directions.
Compared to Huang Qing’s second half of the “Rules Forming Square” sword technique—the circular strike—it was incomparably superior.
Many of the purple lightning bolts swiftly burrowed into the ground, then erupted violently, encircling Xu Fengnian inch by inch, truly turning heaven and earth upside down.
Xu Fengnian silently murmured a single phrase.
“Six thousand li.”
At the critical moment when Xu Fengnian faced the fourth heavenly tribulation, the hundred-zhang dharma body behind the Copper Sage Ancestor, hands clasped in prayer, suddenly expanded.
A vivid and animated scroll appeared between the palms.
There was a Buddha in deep meditation, chanting sutras, causing even stones to nod in understanding.
There was a Daoist immortal expounding the Dao, with celestial maidens scattering flowers.
There was a scholar holding a book, standing at the cliffs of the eastern shore.
There was a sword immortal soaring through the sky, singing as he played his blade.
There was a divine general riding a horse, wielding a spear, clad in radiant golden armor.
Though Huang Qing knew the Copper Sage was a fallen immortal, he had no idea that this Sage was, in fact, the very immortal who had once guarded the heavenly Dao’s gate!
The figures in the scroll were clearly those who had ascended centuries ago!
At that moment, the black tiger, which had been anxiously circling far from the battlefield, suddenly crouched down gently.
A middle-aged Daoist, refined and elegant in appearance, stood beside the black tiger with his hands behind his back. He gazed toward the Copper Sage’s celestial general dharma body, smiling faintly.
In the past eight hundred years, none had possessed such an immortal aura as he.
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