Above the dome of the grand array, Jiang Xingxuan casually flicked her sleeve, and a majestic wave of spiritual energy surged out from her like a towering ocean swell, rippling violently in all directions.
The previously precarious barrier instantly solidified and steadied. At the same time, across the surfaces of the ferocious, bloodthirsty weapons, countless cold, six sided ice crystals spread at a remarkable speed.
Hundreds of lethal weapons were frozen solid in a single sweep.
As frost covered them entirely, those menacing implements seemed to lose whatever external guidance was pulling them, dropping one after another from mid-air.
With the crisis temporarily averted, the disciples finally remembered to wipe the cold sweat from their foreheads, raising their hands in a cupped salute to express their gratitude. “Many thanks to the Daoist Lord for saving us!”
Because the sudden turn of events had caused her heart to race, Cong Jinyue also followed the crowd, looking up at the person floating gracefully in the air on her flying sword.
The Daoist Lord, revered by hundreds of disciples, looked down from above like an enlightened deity of the nine heavens. Yet, within those brilliant, glistening eyes, there had only ever been room for one person, rather than the entire world.
A smile touched Jiang Xingxuan’s brows and eyes, her voice soft and lingering as she lightly tossed an object toward Cong Jinyue. “A-Yue, catch the sword.”
Without the luxury of time to ponder the astonished and envious gazes of the others, nor to figure out whether Jiang Xingxuan’s precision was purely a feat of control or because the immortal sword possessed a spirit of its own, Cong Jinyue did not need to exert much effort. She merely reached out on pure instinct, and the long sword slid right into her palm.
The scabbard was covered in intricate crimson patterns that resembled blazing fire, and a fiery, scarlet radiance rippled along the blade itself.
“Thank you, Master.” Cong Jinyue held the sharp sword in both hands, her fingertips faintly sensing a wave of warmth radiating from it.
It was a heat emanating from the core of the blade—a temperature so intense that even the scabbard could not entirely contain it.
Lifting her gaze once more, Cong Jinyue stared closely and realized that the style of the sword in her hand was surprisingly similar to the flying sword Jiang Xingxuan was currently wielding.
Their respective magic swords seemed like a matched pair crafted by the heavens themselves.
The only difference was that the long sword wielded by Jiang Xingxuan was pitch black, surrounded by faint ink-black spiritual Qi—closely resembling the manifestation of the resonance stone, clearly a supreme treasure of the water element.
Could this sword in her own hand be a fire-element magic artifact?
“As for words of gratitude,” Jiang Xingxuan’s smile faded slightly, a hint of murderous intent dawning upon her face, “A-Yue can tell them to me after we slaughter this pack of scoundrels.”
Mid-sentence, the silenced artifacts suddenly began to hum, and the sound of shattering frost echoed violently throughout the Weapon Graveyard!
All the weapons soared back into the air. Taking a slender, razor-sharp needle artifact as their vanguard, they formed a massive, composite arrow made up of hundreds of individual weapons.
Because it was pieced together from artifacts of various elemental affinities, this giant arrow flickered with a multitude of colored spiritual lights. Its body, stretching over thirty zhang long, was as brilliant as thousands of fireflies, laid bare before everyone’s eyes.
And this giant arrow, spearheaded by the one-zhang golden needle, spun rapidly and viciously pierced straight toward Jiang Xingxuan’s glabella!
Amidst a deafening sonic boom, the scorching-hot sword in Cong Jinyue’s hand felt suddenly as piercingly cold as ice.
In this moment of life and death, Jiang Xingxuan summoned her long sword horizontally before her brow, her left hand dancing through hand seals like blooming flowers as she poured torrential spiritual energy frantically into the ink-black blade.
In the blink of an eye, the crimson-gold needle tip collided directly with the pitch-black blade edge, the two artifacts clashing with a sound like a mighty purple lightning bolt tearing through a damp, gloomy rainy night.
Yet the colossal arrow surged forward with the overwhelming, thousands-of-jin momentum of a hundred weapons. Unable to withstand it completely on her own with just a single person and sword, Jiang Xingxuan was forced downward like a falling meteor, plunging obliquely from the top of the Weapon Graveyard.
Just as the onlookers watched in horror, expecting Jiang Xingxuan to be driven to the ground by the giant arrow, a sharp shout burst from the very center of the blazing sparks—
“Break!”
Sword light flashed, magnificent and curved like a crescent moon!
The giant arrow, dotted with shimmering lights, snapped in half instantly. Collapsing like a mountain of jade, it shattered beyond any recognizable shape.
Most of the artifacts instantly suffered severe damage and plummeted like broken threads. Only a small fraction, still held under some residual pull, deflected and shot fiercely toward the surrounding disciples.
Seeing this, Yue Tongxiu and the others prepared to raise their swords to intercept them. But they saw Jiang Xingxuan spin fiercely mid-fall, lashing out with yet another sword stroke.
A pale ink-colored spiritual energy instantly expanded outward. Wherever it passed, the momentum of all the flying artifacts dimmed in a fraction of a second, dissolving into fine powder a blink later.
Except for the razor-sharp golden needle that had served as the arrowhead.
It was hurtling straight toward Cong Jinyue’s glabella!
Moving with a speed no less fierce than the ambush against Jiang Xingxuan earlier, the golden needle effortlessly pierced through a corner of the protective array, compressing and solidifying the air all around Cong Jinyue.
Cong Jinyue could even hear the faint, cracking crunch of her own bones as they strained under the immense pressure.
Was there anyone who could save her?
Ever since Jiang Xingxuan plummeted from the dome, Mantou had already revealed its true form and sprinted out at full speed. By now, it had rushed to where she was falling, intending to catch her securely on its fluffy tiger back.
Yue Tongxiu was still in the very center of the Weapon Graveyard maintaining the defensive array. Because a corner of the formation had been violently shattered by the golden needle, she, acting as the focal point, had evidently suffered some backlash; her face was pale, and a thin trail of blood leaked from the corner of her mouth.
With Yue Tongxiu in that state, the rest of the armed disciples were faring no better as they struggled to sustain the formation, their bodies stiff and expressions taut, leaving not a single hand free to protect anyone else.
Even the top talents of the sect were struggling to stay upright, and the ordinary disciples, possessing lesser cultivation, were entirely consumed by the need to survive the golden needle’s overwhelming pressure.
No one could save her.
Facing the brink of death, Cong Jinyue forcibly endured the instinctive trembling of her body and pulled the newly gifted long sword completely out of its scabbard.
The sharp blade emerged like a phoenix being reborn from the ashes, blazing with roaring fire and accompanied by a faint, resonant hum.
Cong Jinyue bit down hard on the tip of her tongue, the iron-like, sweet-and-salty taste spreading across her mouth.
The surge of blood and pain acted like an awakening medicine. Amidst the howling gale, she regained control of her arms. Mimicking Jiang Xingxuan’s movement from moments before, she held the long sword upright before her.
She had to rely on herself.
Yet this impending strike was too fierce, far surpassing anything her current physical body could possibly withstand.
However, if her life was destined to end in annihilation today, she would at least face it holding a sharp sword, standing tall until the end.
Like a mayfly—though its life spans only from dawn to dusk, if it once dared to shake a tree with its minuscule strength in a struggle for survival, then even in death, it would have no regrets.
The piercing roar of the tearing wind drowned out the terrified cries of others. Having already accepted the resolve to face death, Cong Jinyue’s heart suddenly grew tranquil.
It was as if their minds were linked: at this moment, she could even feel the sword in her hand trembling slightly—not out of panic or terror, but because it was eager for a fight!
The sword in her hand possessed the will to gamble everything, striving alongside her for a single thread of survival!
Even though the fatal golden needle was closing in on her face at blinding speed, inch by inch.
The crimson-gold needle was now right before her eyes. Cong Jinyue could even see the reflection of her own figure—wobbling precariously yet holding her ground—on the metallic surface of the needle.
Yet beneath this increasingly perilous pressure, her pupils still began to contract violently and uncontrollably, a wave of heat surged up her throat, and her consciousness steadily blurred.
So this was it. When a person became utterly resolute, they lost the ability to shed tears.
The world went dark.
The next instant, sharp edges clashed, metal rang out like a bell, and fierce gales whipped through the air.
Cong Jinyue silently counted to three, yet she did not feel the anticipated pain. Instead, amidst the raging wind, she caught a whiff of faint, elegant magnolia fragrance.
The world was illuminated once more.
Someone was standing before her, blade in hand.
The person before her stood tall and upright, robes fluttering in the wind, jade pendants clinking melodiously against her ears. Her three thousand strands of dark hair had been swept entirely behind her by the sheer force of the sword Qi, falling like an ink-black waterfall, cascading wildly in the wind.
Her posture was composed, as though she were merely enjoying a pleasant mountain breeze rather than single-handedly blocking a weapon meant to kill.
The crimson-gold needle tip was still locked in a stalemate with the dark ink-colored blade. Amidst the shrill, ear-piercing shriek of friction between the lethal weapons, the sharp, relentless needle ultimately failed to advance even another inch, uttering a reluctant, fading hum before instantly disintegrating into fine powder and vanishing entirely.
Only then did Jiang Xingxuan lower her sword and turn around to look at Cong Jinyue. Her red lips curved slightly, her smile as bright and vivid as ever.
Yet her peach-blossom eyes held a pool of early-spring meltwater—just thawing, carrying a gaze so desolate it chilled one to the bone.
Word by word, her melodious voice dropped like falling pearls, shattering into imperceptible fragments as it hit the ground: “A-Yue, I said I would keep you safe.”
Twenty years ago, she failed to honor that promise. Twenty years later, she would pay any price to keep it.
Even if it meant sacrificing her golden core, even if it meant offering up her soul, she would not hesitate.
Even if the person for whom she had lived—and for whom she was willing to die—had completely forgotten everything about their past.
Otherwise, why would A-Yue look at her with confusion upon their reunion today and ask those five words?
Why would she have been unable to handle Mantou’s frantic dash, to the point of burying her face in the tiger’s back and even losing her footing?
How else could she be utterly clueless as to the real reason why she wanted to take her as a disciple, asking the motive with such curiosity and caution, while addressing her as “Master” with such earnest obedience?
And why, unlike before, would she want to avoid her to find a private place to change her magic robes?
More than that, she had raised no objections whatsoever when asked to have a talisman drawn on her palm, and subsequently remained completely unaware of the talisman inscribed through half of Jiang Xingxuan’s spiritual energy.
As everyone knew, talismans were effective simply when drawn on paper; drawing them on skin served no special purpose and was no different from paper talismans.
Furthermore, as a Golden Core cultivator, she had long since stopped needing cinnabar to form talismans. Moreover, what she had openly and brightly inscribed right before A-Yue’s eyes at the time was not just a positioning-and-teleportation talisman.
That other talisman was rare and hard to discern, but they had studied it together in the past, and both knew that no cultivator would ever willingly accept having such a talisman imprinted upon themselves.
Yet today, A-Yue had silently acquiesced to everything with a posture of absolute trust.
If her memories were still intact, then A-Yue’s acting skills would simply be too transcendent.
Therefore, the return of a long-lost, irreplaceable person should have been an overwhelming joy. But these countless anomalies were like needles, piercing Jiang Xingxuan’s heart with an aching pain that left her spirit unsettled.
She had initially considered playing along, which was why she had never directly confronted the matter.
However, outside the red pavilion, the sight of that figure—as bright as the midday sun from her memories—appearing before her once again, as if crossing an endless expanse of time and years, just like when she had first walked toward her all those years ago… in the end, she had still been unable to suppress her obsession.
Whether A-Yue was truly acting or simply unwilling to acknowledge her, she would find out with a reciprocal test.
She wanted to force her to reveal her flaws.
She had personally bound five death-row demon cultivators who deserved no sympathy, thrown them into the Weapon Graveyard, and used an obscure soul art to manipulate their actions—self-directing and self-performing an exquisite, elaborate drama.
This was not something the Jiang Xingxuan of twenty years ago would have done; after all, back then, she too was considered a proud pride of her generation, possessing her own Dao heart and unyielding pride.
But people change.
These twenty years had quietly slipped away amidst endless agony and hopeless waiting. The passionate blood in her heart seemed to have been completely drained and refined away by her own hands, leaving her no longer caring about benevolence or righteousness.
She only wanted that single answer.
In this elaborate drama, even if words could be faked and behavior could be disguised, there was one reaction that could never be masked when faced with mortal peril—
And that was the instinct of wielding a sword through thousands of past repetitions.
Yet just now, faced with life and death, that proud blade belonging to a prodigy—long since sealed away and gathering dust—had actually been drawn into the world with an unfamiliar, clumsy, and green clumsiness.
From that single action alone, Jiang Xingxuan knew this elaborate play had reached its curtain call.
Because she had already received the answer she sought, though it was not the one she desired.
The lover she had waited half a lifetime for had truly forgotten everything, her name, her background, her swordsmanship…
And her, as well.