A Blind Swordsman's Sword Coffin

Buzz!

The six elders stood in the plaza, waiting anxiously. Casualties were all too common inside of the secret realm.

A hunchbacked elder from the Seven Strings Sect chuckled. “Why the long faces? From what I can tell, the energy fluctuations from the secret realm aren’t that strong. It doesn’t seem too dangerous. I’d say... you’re all worrying too much.”

A white-robed man with only one eye from the Myriad Immortal Sword Sect smirked coldly.

“Heh. Everyone knows the greatest danger in the secret realm isn’t the realm itself. However... we’ve already agreed that the disciples are responsible for their own lives. No one’s to blame for any casualties. I just hope no one throws a tantrum later. That’d be embarrassing.”

As he spoke, he could not stop himself from glancing at Shen Lan.

Shen Lan replied coldly, “Xu Zhe, are you trying to say something to my Daxia Sword Sect? Where did you get the nerve to make threats in front of me? If Li Nanting were here, would you dare? He’d pluck your remaining eye right out of your face.”

Xu Zhe pointed at her in fury, but his lips merely quivered—no words came out.

The elder from the Zhenyue Mountain Sect frowned. “Enough! Stop bickering! The exit of the Cloud Dream Immortal Palace has been open for a while now, so why hasn’t anyone come out yet?”

The elders’ expressions darkened.

Indeed, something was wrong. It had been half an hour since the exit opened, yet not a single disciple had emerged.

A heavy silence settled over the whole plaza.

Suddenly, Shen Lan cried out, “Someone’s coming out!”

Buzz!

The shimmering spatial crack twisted as three disheveled figures stumbled out.

Seeing one of the disciples carrying Shen Qi on his back, the elder from Zhenyue Mountain Sect turned pale. He rushed forward and examined Shen Qi’s injuries.

Seeing their severity, he immediately grabbed all three disciples and rushed back to his sect.

Everyone looked at each other. They had a bad feeling. “The Zhenyue Mountain Sect’s disciples are among the strongest... yet only three survived?! And...”

Xu Zhe didn’t finish his sentence, but everyone understood. They weren’t blind.

The sword wounds on Shen Qi’s body made it clear that the two missing disciples had been killed.

Silence fell.

Fifteen minutes later, Li Guanqi and his team finally emerged, supporting each other as they walked.

Shen Lan appeared next to them in a flash, her face pale. “Why are there only four of you? Where’s Ke Qin?”

“She’s dead...” Zhong Lin said gravely.

He didn’t specify how she died. Li Guanqi had told them not to.

They all looked extremely weak, so achieving a breakthrough was out of the question. It was already fortunate that they made it out alive.

Shen Lan didn’t spare Li Guanqi a glance. She turned to glare at the other elders before scoffing. “Hmph! We’re leaving.”

She then pulled out a flying sword and flew them to the cloud boat without another word.

After Shen Lan left, Xu Zhe and the elder from the Seven Strings Sect chatted with schadenfreude, saying, “Haha! That female disciple Shen Lan brought must have been a newly recruited disciple from this year!”

“Tsk, good riddance! Hahaha! Serves them right!”

The remaining elders had their suspicions too. A Daxia Sword Sect disciple had died—likely at the hands of someone from their own sects.

The man from the Myriad Immortal Sword Sect remained calm. He smiled and said, “Looks like our disciples came out on top this time. I wonder if any of us lost people too.”

The woman from Purple Cloud Sect snorted. “Well, it certainly won’t be our sect’s disciples. I bet those Daxia Sword Sect brats just hid the whole time to avoid trouble.”

They waited. A considerable amount of time passed, but no one else emerged.

Xu Zhe smiled and comforted them. “Ha... Haha... It’ll be fine. The nuisances have already left, so they’re probably looting the place for treasure. Isn’t that normal? There’s no need to panic.”

The others nodded, grinning. Based on past experiences, the victors were likely still inside, scavenging for war spoils.

***

As soon as the Daxia Sword Sect’s disciples took to the sky, Li Guanqi whispered urgently, “Elder Shen, we have to hurry! We need to leave immediately!”

Shen Lan was still grieving over Ke Qin’s death, and his tone made her frown. She whispered urgently, “What do you mean? Just what exactly happened in there?”

Ye Feng, equally anxious, had no choice but to urge her in a hushed whisper, “Elder Shen, we’ll tell you when we get back! We must leave as fast as we can!”

But Shen Lan wasn’t satisfied. Noticing this, Li Guanqi cut in before she could press further, saying, “I killed every last one of them. All the disciples from the other four sects.”

Shen Lan stiffened. She nearly lost her balance and tumbled off the sword. Her voice trembled. “All of them? You killed all of them?”

Li Guanqi nodded.

Without hesitation, Shen Lan raised her hand. A blast of ice-blue vital force shot forward.

The disciples could only watch in shock as the sky itself split open—a pitch-black crack, as if the sky were a torn piece of fabric. With another wave of her hand, an ice-blue barrier wrapped around them, and they vanished into the void.

Li Guanqi looked at the middle-aged woman next to him with surprise. Elder Shen is a Nascent Soul Realm cultivator?!

They reappeared on the cloud boat docked at Zhenyue Mountain one breath later. Without wasting a second, Shen Lan steered the vessel away while pulling out a jade slip. Her voice was low.

“Sect Master! We’re on the way back. We need you to meet up with us immediately. Li Guanqi killed all the disciples from four sects in the secret realm. I fear they might join forces to stop us.”

The cloud boat shot through the sky at full speed, vanishing into the clouds.

Before Shen Lan could catch her breath, a message flickered across her jade slip. She stiffened.

—The Zhenyue Mountain Sect owes the Daxia Sword Sect a favor. Shen Qi is the Sect Master’s son.

Li Guanqi quickly gave her the shortest possible summary of the events. When he finished, she didn’t reprimand him. Instead, she looked at him with pride.

With such intelligence... he’s bound for greatness.

Her voice was firm. “Don’t worry. They can’t prove anything as long as we don’t admit it. And even if we did, so what? If those four sects think they are fit to challenge the Daxia Sword Sect, they’re sorely mistaken.

“You did well! The weak-hearted have no business cultivating. But Ke Qin... it’s a pity. I shouldn’t have let her come... Sigh.”

Midway through their journey, five cloud boats suddenly appeared, cutting off their path.

Five elders from the Daxia Sword Sect stood aboard them.

Li Guanqi rose to his feet. Looking at the massive cloud boats surrounding them, he finally felt at ease.