The top sect of Grand Shuo: the Canglan Sect.
Thirty-six peaks plunged like swords and halberds into the Northern Shuo wasteland.
Snow capped the peak tops year-round, while below the waist lay iron-gray rock faces where not a single blade of grass grew.
For millennia, the fierce winds of Northern Shuo had polished the rocks into sharp, distinct angles, making them resemble an array of blades planted into the earth from afar.
On this day:
Gu Yiyou hovered in the air above the Canglan Sect, standing upon a pale-gold stream of sword intent, coming to pay a formal visit.
He looked down at the hand holding his sword.
That hand had grown old.
The skin was loose, blue veins bulged, and the knuckles were deformed from holding a sword for decades.
He had drawn the sword for Shen Xingzhi for over thirty years.
Every time he drew the sword, Shen Xingzhi’s sword intent would flow through his body.
For over thirty years, those strands of sword intent accumulated in his meridians day after day, turning from a tiny trickle into a surging river.
Judging by the sheer majesty and depth of sword intent alone, he was already second to no Earthly Sword Immortal.
Across from him, a hundred zhang away, a burly figure stood atop the main peak of the Canglan Sect with hands behind his back.
The man was towering, a full two heads taller than an ordinary man, with broad shoulders and a thick back, standing there like an iron tower.
He wore black martial attire, the cuffs embroidered with the emblem of the Canglan Sect in gold thread.
The northern wind fluttered his robes, exposing crisscrossing old blade scars on his forearms—marks left by countless life-and-death battles over decades.
His name was Li Kunlun.
He was Grand Shuo’s number one saber grandmaster, the third-ranked Earthly Immortal under heaven.
Li Kunlun had a rugged, cold face with high cheekbones and a square jaw. Deep beneath his brow bones sat a pair of eyes with rare, dark-gold pupils.
Right now, those dark-gold eyes were fixed on Gu Yiyou.
There was neither contempt nor impatience in his gaze, only a gravity settled over decades.
“Gu Yiyou.”
Li Kunlun spoke, his voice low like muffled thunder, echoing incessantly through the thirty-six peaks of the Canglan Sect.
“You traveled thousands of li to my Canglan Sect. Such audacity commands my respect. But do you truly think that with your peak Boundless Realm cultivation, combined with this borrowed sword intent, you can gain an advantage against me?”
Gu Yiyou did not answer.
He slowly drew the sword from its sheath.
The instant the sword was unsheathed, Gu Yiyou’s atmosphere shifted abruptly.
A majestic, vast wave of sword intent erupted from within him, sending his graying hair and beard fluttering backward.
The pale-gold sword intent beneath his feet expanded several times over in a split second, transforming into a rainbow of sword qi spanning the sky.
The light of the sword rainbow reflected off the snow of the thirty-six peaks, painting them gold.
Li Kunlun’s pupils narrowed slightly.
He could feel the power contained within this sword intent.
It was by no means a power belonging to the peak Boundless Realm, but sword intent at the genuine Earthly Immortal level.
Yet Li Kunlun could also see that while this sword intent was vast, Gu Yiyou could not unleash its full power.
Nor could he wield it with the effortless mastery of a true Earthly Sword Immortal.
“A fine body of sword intent indeed.”
Li Kunlun said slowly, pulling his right hand out from behind his back and opening his fingers.
A pitch-black long blade shot through the air from the depths of Canglan Sect’s main peak, settling firmly into his hand.
The blade was roughly four feet long, pitch-black like ink, yet its edge gleamed with a blinding line of silver.
“Pity you are unworthy of it.”
Before his voice had even faded, Li Kunlun moved.
His form vanished from the peak, appearing twenty zhang before Gu Yiyou in the very next moment!
The pitch-black long blade carved a straight trajectory in his hands.
Without flourish, without variation.
It was simply the most basic, pure vertical strike.
Yet when this strike descended, the mountain rocks of the thirty-six peaks—unshaken by the fierce northern winds for millennia—trembled for the first time under its sheer force!
Gu Yiyou raised his sword horizontally to block.
Sword intent collided with blade aura, blowing apart every cloud within several hundred zhang.
The snow atop Canglan Sect’s main peak was whipped up by the shockwave into white waves across the sky, only to be ground to dust in the next instant by residual blade and sword energy!
Gu Yiyou slid back several dozen zhang before managing to stabilize himself.
The hand holding his sword trembled slightly, the webbing between his thumb and index finger tearing open, blood dripping down the hilt.
“Again!”
Gu Yiyou bellowed, advancing instead of retreating as he transformed into a cyan sword light, charging at Li Kunlun!
The sword fluttered in his hand, producing thousands of sword shadows, each carrying the majestic might of half of Shen Xingzhi’s sword intent.
The sword shadows filled the sky, dyeing the heaven above the Canglan Sect’s main peak in a brilliant cyan.
And Li Kunlun’s response was merely a single strike.
The pitch-black long blade slashed horizontally, its blade aura turning into a black crescent arc dozens of zhang long, colliding head-on with the thousands of sword shadows.
Sword shadows and blade aura tore fiercely against each other in the sky, each collision exploding into a burst of blinding light.
The disciples of the Canglan Sect had long since retreated outside the mountain gate; those with lower cultivation were pressed flat against the ground by the overflowing pressure, unable to move.
The two fought from the air above the main peak to the eastern peak, and from the eastern peak to the western peak.
Wherever they passed, mountain rocks shattered, snow vaporized, and ancient ice that had never melted for a thousand years was carved into deep trenches dozens of zhang long by sword qi and blade aura.
The intensity of this duel was enough to stir the soul of any martial artist watching.
However, after a hundred exchanges, Gu Yiyou’s disadvantage began to show.
Li Kunlun was right.
In his hands, this sword intent could not display its full power.
He could feel the subtle variations within the sword intent and perceive the sword insights left behind by Shen Xingzhi in every fragment, yet he simply could not weave them together seamlessly.
He was like a literate child holding the scriptures of sages—he knew every character, yet could not comprehend the profound truth between the lines.
Li Kunlun, however, was different.
His blade was his own.
Every swing of the pitch-black long blade in his hand was natural and unblemished, the momentum of the blade blending perfectly with blade intent without the slightest disconnect.
This was the fundamental gap between an Earthly Immortal and a peak Boundless Realm master.
The three-hundredth exchange.
Li Kunlun’s slash forced Gu Yiyou back, the lingering force of the blade shearing off half the summit of a mountain miles away.
Gu Yiyou rode the force back, stabilizing himself a hundred zhang away.
His chest heaved violently, and his sword hand trembled uncontrollably.
“Gu Yiyou.”
Li Kunlun’s voice sounded once more, with a trace of regret in his tone.
“If your master, Shen Xingzhi, were here to fight me with this sword intent, the outcome would still be uncertain.”
Li Kunlun held the pitch-black long blade horizontally before him.
The air within a hundred zhang around him began to warp violently!
“To be able to fight me to this point is enough for you to be proud. But after this strike, it will be over.”
The blade intent was like a prison, pressing down on Gu Yiyou from all directions.
The ambient qi of heaven and earth within dozens of li froze completely beneath this strike, and even the never-ending gale of Northern Shuo halted at this moment.
The snow across the thirty-six peaks of Canglan Sect was blasted into the sky all at once by the blade intent, condensing into countless snow-white blade shadows in midair, their tips all pointing directly at Gu Yiyou!
This strike was the culmination of Li Kunlun’s lifelong cultivation in the Way of the Saber.
It was the outpouring of all the blade intent he had accumulated during decades of guarding Grand Shuo.
Even if Shen Xingzhi were here, he would have to face this strike with utter seriousness.
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