Chapter 192: The Ultimate Duel (1)

“Situhai, I challenge you, here and now.”

Right after those words, the legendary duel that shocked the universe began. The match was profoundly imbalanced. On one side stood Situhai, the renowned wandering swordsman, a figure whose name alone sent chills down the spines of countless swordsmen across the cosmos. On the other was Yang Hao, an obscure, newly emerging figure with seemingly little to his name.

But after this battle, Yang Hao was no longer just a nobody. Even the Senate and the Emperor of the Empire began to pay close attention to him, eager to understand what kind of young man would dare challenge such an invincible master. Was he blessed with an extraordinary courage, or did he possess some extraordinary, world-shocking skill?

At the time, however, things were not seen that way. To everyone present, Yang Hao seemed to be walking to his death. He could have lived a peaceful life, but for the sake of his friend and a single word from Long Yun, he willingly chose to fall beneath Situhai’s blade.

Especially after Situhai slashed his sword through the heavens, the crowd trembled in fear, convinced that Yang Hao would have no choice but to retreat.

But Yang Hao struck back.

His first move was the Aurora. Yang Hao unsheathed his treasured sword with a reverse grip, channeling his inner energy into it. Though this was a signature technique of the lightsaber style, Yang Hao wielded it as if he had mastered it over decades.

A brilliant, dazzling light erupted from the tip of his sword, shattering into countless tiny beams that shot toward Situhai. These beams were as fine as ox hair, yet they penetrated everything, each carrying immense power. If struck, even the strongest would suffer grievous wounds.

But the Aurora could not harm Situhai. Yang Hao had tried it before. Yet the true brilliance of this strike was not aimed at Situhai himself. The scattered beams of the Aurora also engulfed everyone on Situhai’s side, including Luo Dongjie, Ning Ziyun, and the severely wounded members of the Mingse faction. Even if Situhai could dodge, those around him, especially Luo Dongjie, would be pierced by a thousand swords.

A single sword move, two birds struck.

“Bravo!” Surprisingly, Situhai wore a delighted expression. He looked like a parched sponge suddenly soaked in water, his entire being revitalized and filled.

Situhai neither retreated nor dodged. With a flick of his wrist, his rusty sword spun in a circle. The motion seemed casual, yet it unleashed tremendous energy. The surrounding air and force fields were swept into motion. As Situhai’s sword tip swirled, the air howled and was drawn in, creating a black hole-like vortex at the center of the circle, sucking in all the beams of Yang Hao’s Aurora.

“Round Deflection!”—one of the defensive moves from Situhai’s Ten错 Sword Techniques.

But before his words had even faded, Yang Hao had already vanished. The Aurora had been a feint all along, meant to provoke Situhai into action. Once Situhai had responded, he had already fallen behind.

Yang Hao activated the Feihua Phantom Step, moving so fast that he became invisible. It was as if he had disappeared into the air, his breath undetectable.

Even Situhai, with all his swordsmanship, could not suppress a flicker of surprise. It had not been long since he last saw Yang Hao, yet the young swordsman’s progress was astonishingly rapid. Situhai focused, even closing his eyes, extending his rusty sword forward, using his spiritual sense to detect Yang Hao’s movements.

Suddenly, Yang Hao reappeared behind Situhai, leaping high into the air. In his hand, the Flame Sword roared furiously, five fire dragons spiraling upward, trailing an impossibly long arc of blazing energy.

“Five Dragon Severance!” Yang Hao roared, unleashing a fiery attack that blazed down toward Situhai’s head with unstoppable force. This strike seemed capable of slaying gods and demons alike, as if nothing in the world could stand in its way.

The Five Dragon Severance technique was derived from the Dan Ding Sect’s sword art, and when combined with the Flame Sword, it became a perfect harmony. When Yang Hao first used it, he had cleaved through a spacecraft in the Three Crystal Sea, a testament to its devastating power.

At that moment, Situhai still had his back to Yang Hao, not even raising his sword. He could only sense the searing heat from above, an inescapable inferno. It seemed as if he could neither block nor evade.

The five dragons converged into a single ball of hellfire, ready to engulf Situhai completely.

The sight turned Luo Dongjie pale. He had always believed Situhai to be the ultimate swordsman in the universe, unbeatable. He had never seen a sword technique as powerful as the Five Dragon Severance. He could never have imagined that Yang Hao, who seemed so frail on the outside, could harbor such immense power—power enough to even defeat Situhai.

Would Situhai truly be defeated?

He answered with his sword.

Without even turning, Situhai casually thrust a single sword strike behind his head. It was an utterly mundane, almost bewildering move. How could such a simple, weak, and drifting stroke be the work of a supreme swordsman? Even a three-year-old wielding a wooden sword could deliver something more forceful and stable.

But Yang Hao was on the brink of death.

As Situhai’s sword moved—so ordinary, so limp, so drifting—it was as if a warm flower had bloomed within the entire cabin. What Situhai had slashed was not a sword strike, but a gesture, a style, a touch of sorrow.

It was a move filled with melancholy and a godlike presence, as if standing above the clouds, gazing down at the mortal world. It was not a sword move; it was the sword god’s move, a divine slash from a celestial being.

The tip of the sword struck the vulnerable spot among the five dragons. Yang Hao’s fire dragons were not true dragons, so they lacked a weak point such as the逆鳞. However, every sword technique had its own vulnerability, its own critical weak spot. Situhai’s casual backhand slash had accurately hit the fatal weakness in Yang Hao’s Five Dragon Severance technique.

Yang Hao’s sword technique was broken, severed, extinguished.

Yang Hao himself was about to die.

Situhai’s sword shattered the Five Dragon Severance, yet the momentum did not end there. Instead, it transformed, like a barren wasteland scorched by fire, only to be revived by a spring breeze.

Situhai turned around. His eyes gleamed, and his rusty sword shone like it had descended from heaven. This blade, which had drunk the blood of countless warriors and bested countless masters, was now brimming with battle intent. But Situhai did not aim directly at Yang Hao. Instead, he leisurely extended the second half of his strike in a relaxed, elegant arc to one side.

To the onlookers, such a weak sword move was no better than a child’s play. But coming from Situhai’s hand, it was entirely different.

Yang Hao’s face twisted in pain. His internal organs and limbs felt as if they were already enveloped by the sword’s aura. Though the blade still hovered at a distance, no matter how he moved or reacted, he could not escape its deadly intent.

What is swordsmanship? What is the most unfathomable sword art in the universe? What is true power?

Yang Hao now understood. If gods in the divine realm relied on innate talent to overpower others, then Situhai’s current realm required no strength at all. His sword art did not rely on brute force but on control. With a single strike, it was no longer about injuring or killing—it was about domination. Whether advancing or retreating, dodging or attacking, none could escape the sword’s supreme authority.

The Eleventh Sword was the most accomplished and powerful technique of Situhai’s life.

When he first conceived it, there might still have been those who could counter it. But not anymore. Situhai had gained new insight, and he was no longer the same. Naturally, his sword had also changed.

Every swordsman, in their lifetime, seeks only the true essence of the sword. Situhai gained renown at a young age, his sword skills matched by only a handful of people in the world. For a long time afterward, his sword techniques remained stagnant. This continued until he encountered a great disaster. Following that, Situhai abandoned all the sword techniques he had previously learned and created the Ten错 Sword Methods. It was no longer just swordsmanship—it had become his very life, a reflection and repentance of his past.

But all that ended with the Eleventh Sword.

That was an entirely different realm. Ordinary swordsmen wielded swords to kill. Later, Situhai wielded swords to correct. But now, in the Eleventh Sword, the sword was control, the sword was a world, the sword was a life.

Situhai was the god of control, commanding the sun to rise and the moon to fall, deciding life and death. And Yang Hao was caught in this sword’s grasp, as if trapped in a small room, staring at a massive blade hanging above, unable to block, unable to dodge. The only thing left was to wait for it to fall and take his life.

Yang Hao was a lamb awaiting slaughter. He dropped his sword, but even that could not grant him a moment’s reprieve.

Situhai knew better than anyone that Yang Hao could no longer fight. He couldn’t even move. He was caught in a state of neither advancing nor retreating, neither living nor dying, waiting only for Situhai’s rusty sword to pierce his heart. As the blade pierced Yang Hao’s chest, blood sprayed into the air, and the crowd watched in stunned disbelief. Situhai could only add another scar to his life.

But regardless, he had to deliver that final strike.

To Situhai, Yang Hao was already a corpse—still breathing, but with death only a moment away.

He raised his wrist and thrust forward, clean and simple.

But Yang Hao moved.

It was the most bizarre event of the night. Situhai was absolutely certain that no one could escape his Eleventh Sword. Yang Hao should not have been able to move, not even to breathe.

Yet Yang Hao did move—but not entirely by himself. The situation was so strange that even those who witnessed it were left stunned, unable to react for what felt like an eternity.

Because now, there were two Yang Haos.

There was only one Yang Hao in the world, yet at times, two could appear. This was the secret strength that gave him the confidence to challenge Situhai.

From the outside, one appeared more solid, still standing in place, while the other was dimmer, more agile, as if it had peeled away from Yang Hao’s body, flickering and vanishing to the side in an instant.