Deciding Who Is Superior, and Determining Life and Death

The divine sword left its sheath, yet no blinding radiance burst forth.

Instead, a gray, profound deathly sword-intent—one that could devour all color and light in the world—poured out silently along the blade.

The Great Luo Limitless Sword Qi!

But this time, unlike the raging fury and outward eruption that had slain countless cultivators before, the sword qi was different.

It had condensed to its absolute extreme, returning to the primordial simplicity. Every strand of killing intent, every spatial law, every razor-edge sharpness was perfectly gathered by Ye Xuan into a faint, thread-thin gray sword line.

This, was the Great Luo Limitless Sword Qi that had stepped into the Realm of Perfection!

One sword to break all laws, one sword to sever all karma!

"Go."

Ye Xuan's thin lips parted slightly, and a single word drifted out.

He didn't even bother with any intricate sword stance. He simply turned his wrist, the long sword sweeping upward from below—no flourish, no trick.

That thread-thin gray sword line traced a perfect arc in the air, as if harmonizing with the very tracks of heaven's dao, and collided head-on—without any adornment—with the black great halberd that carried world-shattering might.

Boom! Rumble!

The entire blood-colored wasteland was ignited in that instant!

There was no brilliant light of spiritual energy—only the purest storm of destruction.

The terrifying shockwave erupted outward in a ring-like wave, the earth churning like violent ocean waves. Several towering, blood-red mountain peaks surrounding the area, upon contact with the aftershock, didn't even go through the process of crumbling—they were simply vaporized into nothing.

Even with Ye Xuan's protective qi shield deliberately left behind to guard her, Ying'er, hiding far in the distance, was still shaken until her blood surged and her small face turned pale. She stumbled back dozens of steps before barely managing to steady herself.

At the center of the clash, time itself seemed to freeze.

The armored youth was vicious to the extreme. Facing the cutting of the perfected Great Luo Limitless Sword Qi, he didn't retreat a single step. His eyes bulged wide as he madly burned his own innate essence blood.

The black destruction laws coiled around the great halberd, like enraged dragons, biting hard onto that gray sword line. The two were momentarily locked in a deadlock mid-air!

"Break... for me!"

The armored youth's eyes cracked at the edges; every muscle in his body swelled to the point of bursting, like a crazed primordial beast, trying to crush this sword qi with sheer brute force.

But Ye Xuan merely watched him coldly, then abruptly pressed his wrist downward.

Shrrrk!

The Great Luo Limitless Sword Qi finally revealed its incomprehensible, terrifying suppression.

This was a sword art that pointed directly toward the Great Luo Golden Immortal realm!

A teeth-grinding, scalp-numbing sound of metal snapping tore across the wasteland.

That great halberd—forged from Nine Heavens Meteorite Iron mixed with the starcore of an ancient star, potent enough to withstand top-grade Dao artifacts—was split cleanly in two from the middle like fragile rotten wood by the gray sword line!

Then, the gray line didn't lose any momentum. Like a gentle breeze brushing over still water, it softly passed through the armored youth's chest.

The storm stopped abruptly.

The swirled blood-colored dust and killing intent, in that instant, cascaded back down to the ground like a tide.

The armored youth remained frozen in mid-air, still holding the same downward-striking stance with both hands on the halberd.

Crack...

A barely perceptible fissure suddenly appeared on his indestructible, dark-golden armor. The crack was extremely thin, yet impeccably smooth, running from his left shoulder down diagonally all the way to his right abdomen.

In that single moment, the youth's aura, like a pool with its plug pulled, had its vitality utterly severed—cleanly and completely—by the Great Luo Limitless Sword Qi.

However, unexpectedly, there was no fear of defeat on this peerless prodigy's face. No trembling before death. No resentment or unwillingness at his end.

He did not beg for mercy like Thunderclap had.

He only slowly lowered his head, looked at his weapon broken into two pieces, then felt the rapidly fading vitality and the collapsing divine soul within him.

A moment later, an unprecedented, brilliant light burst from his eyes. His cracked lips twitched slightly, and he actually revealed a smile—one of release, of satisfaction, of pure and absolute clarity.

"What a fast sword..."

The youth lifted his head with difficulty, gazing deeply at the white-robed, white-haired figure across from him. In that gaze, there was no hatred—only reverence and longing for a higher, deeper dao.

"Excellent... I am outmatched. To die beneath a sword art of such supreme, flawless attainment is only fitting. What a satisfaction!"

He burst into laughter, his voice carrying nothing but the peace of a true cultivator—one who, having witnessed supreme swordsmanship, could face death without regret.

The path of seeking the dao was always meant to be walked with songs. Whether you won or lost, whether you lived or died—that was the way!

Ye Xuan watched him quietly. With a slight flick of his wrist, he slowly returned the Sun-Severing Divine Sword to its sheath.

In that instant of the blade returning, a rare glimmer of light flashed through Ye Xuan's eyes—eyes that had long gone frozen and devoid of emotion after all the betrayals he had suffered.

It was respect. Respect for a pure seeker of the dao.

This world was full of vermin like Thunderclap—scheming, bullying, stealing fame through despicable means.

But a madman who would throw himself into the flames of the great dao without hesitation, and die without regret—that kind of man deserved for Ye Xuan to swing this sword with his full, honest intention.

"Walk well."

Ye Xuan's low voice echoed slowly across the desolate blood-red wasteland.

Thud.

The armored youth's body dropped straight from mid-air, crashing heavily onto the blood-soaked earth. The smile still lingered at the corner of his mouth as he completely lost all sign of life.

Ye Xuan walked forward slowly.

Surprisingly, the Devouring Heaven Demon Art inside his body remained utterly still.

Facing the immensely tempting, massive vital essence and blood of a half-step Integration-stage prodigy, Ye Xuan, for the first time ever, chose not to devour.

Instead, he flicked his fingers together into a sword form, walked to a massive blood-red rock nearby, and let his sword qi extend. With a few swift slashes, he carved out a two-zhang-tall stone tablet—flat and smooth as a mirror—and stood it before the prodigy's corpse.

Ye Xuan didn't know this man's name, nor did he need to.

His finger traced wildly on the stele, carving in bold, elegant strokes eight great characters seeped in desolation and slaughter:

"He who hears the dao dies; beneath the sword, no names remain."

After that,

Ye Xuan casually waved a hand, drawing both the storage ring at the armored youth's waist and the halberd snapped in two pieces into his own storage ring.

Then he turned around. His white hair whipped in the bloody wind, and his face returned to that death-still calm, like an ancient well.

"Husband..." Ying'er hurried forward to his side, looking up at the stone tablet with a newfound understanding of this cruel world dawning in her eyes.

"Let's go."

Ye Xuan didn't look back. With Ying'er in tow, he stepped over the blood-drenched ground and headed without hesitation deeper into the unknown abyss of the Burial Heaven Netherworld.