He Was Once Unrivaled

The night was as deep as water, silently flowing over every inch of Green Ox Village.

Outside the window, autumn insects chirped, and occasionally the low barking of a mongrel dog broke the silence, making the desolate village in late autumn seem even more peacefully boundless.

Inside the room, a pea-sized oil lamp flickered with a dim, yellowish glow.

Ye Xuan leaned back in an old rattan chair, holding an ordinary piece of peach wood in his hand, clumsily but intently carving a hairpin.

Ying'er, on the other hand, sat on a low stool. By the faint lamplight, she carefully mended the frayed edges of Ye Xuan’s blue robe. As her needle moved back and forth, she would occasionally lift her head to steal a glance at her focused husband, the smile at the corners of her eyes thick and unresolvable.

Days like these were as tranquil as a dream one could not bear to wake from.

"Husband."

Ying'er bit off the thread, as if suddenly remembering something, and tilted her head curiously to ask: "These past ten years, the village elders have all said that a deity once lived here long ago called the Peerless Sword Emperor. Seeing how you were in the sword tomb... was that Sword Emperor Ye Wushuang really you?"

Ye Xuan paused slightly in his carving. Wood shavings fluttered down.

He blew the bits from his fingertips, raised his head, and cast his gaze beyond the broken window lattice toward the vast, desolate river of stars. His eyes suddenly grew deep and weathered, as if they could see through the rise and fall of ten thousand years in a single glance.

"Yes."

Ye Xuan's voice was quiet, carrying a hint of a wistful, otherworldly irony: "That was the purest life I ever lived."

Ying'er set down her needlework, moved her stool closer to Ye Xuan’s knees, and rested her chin on her hands. "Husband, since it was all reincarnation, why did you only call yourself Ye Wushuang in that one life? The other lives—including this one—you’ve always been Ye Xian."

Ye Xuan put down the roughly shaped wooden hairpin and reached out to tousle Ying'er’s soft hair. A dark glint flashed deep in his eyes.

"Because... the name Ye Xuan is too heavy."

"Heavy?" Ying'er was puzzled.

"Ye Xuan is not a simple mortal name. It is a curse carved into the very depths of the soul, a fate spanning endless epochs."

Ye Xuan gave a faint smile, but his tone was sharp with a chilling edge: "Every life lived as Ye Xuan I was brilliant beyond measure, yet I could never escape betrayal and a desolate end. It was as if some invisible, great hand was wantonly manipulating the destiny of Ye Xuan."

"So, when I was born—though in an infant’s body—I possessed a born intelligence. I sensed a terrifying karmic force and, thus, renamed myself."

"I refused to be Ye Xuan. I chose to be Ye Wushuang."

"Peerless—without equal under heaven."

Ying'er listened, half-understanding. She blinked her bright, wide eyes and pursued the matter: "And after you became Ye Wushuang? What was that husband of mine like in that life?"

Ye Xuan leaned back slightly, the rattan chair groaning under the strain with a faint "creak."

He closed his eyes, and a dusty memory of iron and blood unfolded like an ink wash painting.

"That life..."

His voice became ethereal and distant, drawing Ying'er into that magnificent, chaotic age of gods and demons.

"In that life, I was born right here in Green Ox Village. No father, no mother, no kin. Old Granny Wang dug me out of the heavy snow on the village road in the dead of winter."

"I ate the food of a hundred families and wore the clothes of a hundred homes. Every household in the village had shared a bowl of life-saving hot congee with me."

Ying'er gasped, covering her mouth: "So my husband was once a poor soul too..."

"Poor? Perhaps."

A faint, solitary curve appeared at the corner of Ye Xuan's lips: "But precisely because I had neither father nor mother, no attachments, my heart was purer than any cultivator’s."

"At three years old, I picked up a straight tree branch. From that day on, my hand was never empty."

"While other village children played in the mud or hid and sought, I practiced my sword. From spring blossoms to winter snow, from sunrise to the setting of the blood-red sun."

"At seven, a few wandering swordsmen broke into the village, planning to slaughter and rob. I walked out carrying that branch."

At this, Ye Xuan casually flicked his finger, producing a sharp "crack" of air. "One move was all it took. The hundred-forged steel blades of three so-called first-rate martial artists shattered into pieces, and they fled the village on all fours in their terror."

"At ten, my sword aura could already cut down waterfalls hundreds of feet away from a distance. That same year, I left without a word to bid farewell and walked out of Green Ox Village."

"Because I knew that this small patch of earth could no longer contain my sword."

Ying'er listened, spellbound, her eyes glittering with stars.

The image of that small, proud, solitary boy—holding a withered branch—seemed to span the river of time and step step by step into the treacherous, ever-changing world of immortal cultivation.

"What happened next?" she asked.

"Next..." Ye Xuan's gaze suddenly turned cold. "Next, I entered the cultivation world. I didn’t join any sect, and I sought no teacher. I just kept walking, fighting, and challenging."

"I didn't need a master, because the laws of heaven and earth themselves served as my teacher. I didn’t need manuals or techniques, because the sword in my hand was the strongest law of all ages."

"At fifteen, I established my foundation. At eighteen, I formed my golden core. At twenty-five, I shattered my core into an nascent soul..."

"Such a pace of cultivation shook the entire Central Land back then. Countless immortal holy lands and eternal imperial courts extended olive branches to me, offering me the seat of sacred heir, offering city-toppling princesses as dao companions."

At this point, Ye Xuan paused. His gaze fell upon Ying'er's face, and he asked with an air of significance: "Do you know what was the most baffling thing about Ye Wushuang’s life?"

"What?"

"That in his entire life, he never had a partner. He never even gave a second glance to any woman in the world."

Ying'er was taken aback: "Why? With my husband being so outstanding, there must have been countless fairy sisters pining for you, right?"

"Countless, like fish in a river." Ye Xuan chuckled softly, as if brushing away dust from his robes. "That year, the Sacred Maiden of the Jade Lake knelt three days and three nights outside my Sword Hut just to see my face. The demoness of the Devil Sect swore that if I did not marry her, she’d slaughter all mortals as my fitting tribute. The peerless Empress of the Great Zhou offered half her empire as her dowry, only begging for me to stay in her palace..."

"But Ye Wushuang didn't look at a single one."

"Why?" Ying'er grew more perplexed.

Ye Xuan pointed to his heart. His tone was as calm as it was ruthless:

"In Ye Wushuang's heart, there was only the sword."

"He saw love and sentiment as rust clinging to the sword’s blade. The fetters of the mundane world could only slow the speed with which he drew his sword."

"To keep his sword heart absolutely clear and empty, he severed all attachment. The Supreme Dao of forgetting emotion was not being emotionless—it meant that beyond the way of the sword, there was no room in his eyes for heaven, earth, or anything else."

"So..." Ye Xuan took a deep breath. The suppressed fervor flickered for a moment in his eyes. "It took less than five hundred years."

"Ye Wushuang stepped through the void and entered the legendary Mahayana Stage."

"Five... five hundred years?"

Though Ying'er was not deeply versed in cultivation, she knew that the path of ascension was long and arduous. An ordinary cultivator would need several thousand years just to reach the Spirit Transformation Stage.

Five hundred years to reach Mahayana—this was a myth that shook the ages!

"Yes, five hundred years."

Ye Xuan looked down at his now slightly rough, calloused palms. "Back then, I was truly strong. So strong that the world fell silent, so strong that I drew my sword and looked around, yet found no living person who could withstand a single blow from me."

"Once, I sliced the Heavenly River with one stroke, forcing the countless stars to change their course. Another time, I rode alone with my sword, cutting through the Nine Hells."

"And it was at my very peak that a demonic dragon from beyond the heavens tore through the walls of the realm and descended upon the mortal world."

Ying'er’s body trembled violently. In her mind flashed the horrifying image of that towering, sky-shrouded corpse dragon from the Sword Tomb—the monster they had encountered there.

"Is that... the same monster we met in the Sword Tomb?"

"Hm. That was its remnant corpse."

Ye Xuan nodded, his gaze growing distant, as if he were reliving that cataclysmic bloodbath that had shattered an era.

"That was a true world-ending beast. Wherever it passed, life was severed. It devoured billions upon billions of living beings. The entire cultivation world unleashed every last resource, but before it, they were like clay chickens and pottery dogs—utterly worthless."

"In the end, I was the one who went."

"That battle lasted seven days and seven nights."

"The sky was punched through with holes, and the waters of the Four Seas were completely boiled dry. Nine of my lifetime-bound flying swords were broken."

"But I did not retreat half a step. Because if I stepped back, the countless living beings behind me—and this village called Green Ox that raised me—would all turn to ashes."

"In the end, I turned my body into a sword, sacrificing my five hundred years of towering cultivation and Mahayana lifespan to strike a single slash—a slash that astonished the ages yet severed my own hope of survival."

"That slash cut off its dragon head and pinned down its dragon soul."

"But that slash also drained my entire life. Ye Wushuang's story came to an abrupt halt at its most dazzling peak."

A long, heavy silence settled over the room.

The oil lamp occasionally crackled, giving off a faint popping sound.

Ying'er listened until her eyes brimmed with tears, crystalline drops swirling in her gaze.

She felt both pride for the peerless hero named Ye Wushuang and a piercing ache for his brief, lonely life at such lofty heights.

A life without love, a life devoted solely to the sword—yet in the end, he gave his life for the very mortal world he had long severed his ties to.

Brilliant to the extreme, yet bitter and cold to the extreme.

"I never imagined..."

Ying'er sniffled, her nose sore and her eyes reddened, as she looked up at Ye Xuan. "I never imagined that my stoic husband, who never sought a Dao partner, was so powerful... so much stronger than the man you are now."

Ye Xuan watched her—that delicate expression that seemed both on the verge of tears and desperately holding them back—and a playful impulse stirred in his heart.

He leaned forward slightly, closing in on Ying'er’s face barely a breath away, and a mischievous smirk curled at the corner of his mouth.

"Right."

"Ying'er, tell me—if in this life I also follow Ye Wushuang's path, severing all romantic ties and not marrying a Dao partner, could I once again attain Mahayana, or even soar directly to immortality?"

"If so, I wouldn't have to worry about being betrayed by women like in my past lives. I wouldn't have any weaknesses anymore. And I wouldn't have to hole up in this remote backwater, chopping wood and hauling water every day."

"As long as my heart has no fetters, my sword will naturally commune with the divine."

"Tell me—wouldn't this be a great blessing for me?"

Ye Xuan’s last word had barely fallen, and the mischievous grin on his lips hadn’t even fully faded,

when suddenly, a faint scent of soap mixed with a girl's natural fragrance rushed toward him.

Ying'er lunged at him like an enraged little beast. Her hands locked tightly around Ye Xuan’s neck, and her soft, warm cherry lips—recklessly, in utter disregard of form—pressed onto Ye Xuan’s.

"Mmph..."

Ye Xuan’s eyes flew wide open, utterly stunned.

It was a kiss devoid of any technique, yet brimming with panic, possessiveness, and dominance.

It was only raw instinct—seizing and sealing.

She wanted to use her own warmth to block every word of "heartlessness," "cutting off love," and "not seeking a Dao partner"—shove them all back down his throat!

After a long moment, their lips parted.

Ying'er pulled back half an inch, panting heavily, her face flushed like a ripe, dripping cherry. But her eyes—misty and drenched with tears—held an unprecedented, fierce resolve.

She cupped Ye Xuan’s cheeks with both hands, pressed her forehead stubbornly against his, and between their warm intertwined breaths, she bit out every word:

"I won't allow it!"

"I won't let you say that anymore!"

"Ye Wushuang is dead! You are Ye Xuan now—Ying'er's husband!"

Her voice was laced with a distinct sob, but also a ruthless, unreasonable tyranny:

"No matter how strong you were before, what good was it? You were all alone, not even someone to warm your meals, mend your clothes, or share your bed in winter! What’s the point of being that cold, indifferent immortal?"

"In this life, I won’t let you be some heartless, love-severing Sword God!"

"I’m going to be your weakness! I’m going to be your burden! You’ll never shake me off in this lifetime!"

Staring at this little woman who was usually as gentle as a cat but now bared her claws and teeth to keep him close, the flicker of teasing in Ye Xuan’s heart melted instantly into a pool of tenderness.

He slowly extended his arms, turned the tables, and pulled Ying'er tightly into his embrace, pressing her into his very bones. His chin rested on the top of her head, breathing in the faint fragrance that captivated his soul, and he let out a long, quiet sigh.

He understood it better than anyone, after all.

Ye Wushuang was unparalleled in power, but he was a lonely sword without a scabbard. Too sharp at the edge, and inevitably he broke.

But in this life, because of the Ying'er in his arms, his sword had reined in its killing intent—and finally found a home, the warmth that belonged to a human.

"Alright."

Ye Xuan whispered by her ear, his voice low, husky, and as gentle as if it could melt into water:

"I won't be Ye Wushuang anymore."

"In this life, I’ll only be Ying'er’s Ye Xuan."

"As long as you’re here, I won’t cultivate that damned loveless Dao. I’ll just cultivate... eternal longing."

Outside the window, the silvery moonlight streamed down, bathing the embracing silhouettes of the two in a soft halo.

The engraving knife that Ye Xuan had casually set on the table gleamed cold and hard under the moon’s glow—and yet, it radiated a serene beauty, as if time itself had stilled.