ARK SPIRIT

Night descended quickly over the frontline camp.

Outside the resting quarters, the desert wind occasionally howled past in gusts, carrying sand that rattled against the stone walls. Farther away, the sounds of soldiers changing shifts, formation flags snapping in the wind, and footsteps passing through the corridors continued without pause.

A battlefield never truly slept, and neither did Hao Nhien.

Inside the Cave Dwelling he had placed within the stone room Phi Long had arranged for him, several mid-grade spirit stones were set in a simple circle around his body. Pure spiritual qi slowly seeped from them, gathering into thin streams that entered his body with each cycle of breathing.

Hao Nhien sat cross-legged at the center of the formation, his eyes half closed. From the outside, he appeared to be quietly recovering after a full day and night of hurried travel and the battle in Black Wind Valley.

But his mind was anything but calm.

The lightning wound on his shoulder still throbbed whenever his cultivation method circulated too strongly, and his meridians had yet to fully relax after the long journey. Yet all of that had been pushed into the background by two words that refused to leave his thoughts.

Firmament.

The Heavenly Eye Tribe, the war more than a thousand years ago, a force that had once come from beyond the Spirit Cloud Continent, those who might have been trapped in the Western Wastes, and the name Firmament Continent that had once appeared in his memories.

The pieces were still scattered. Hao Nhien could not say that they belonged to the same picture, much less confirm whether the Firmament Lieu Thien Van had spoken of was truly the same place that existed in his memories.

But for the first time, a faint thread had appeared between those fragments.

And that thread led toward Anh Nhien.

Since awakening on the Spirit Cloud Continent, he had experienced far too much.

Thanh Van Town, the Tieu Dao Sect, the Spirit Beast Forest, and now the Western Wastes.

At times, Hao Nhien felt as if he were merely being carried along by the current of this world, drifting farther and farther from the place where he had once belonged. The more he cultivated, the more he fought, and the harder he struggled to survive, the more a fear buried deep inside him refused to disappear.

That one day, the name Anh Nhien would become nothing more than a wound buried deep within his memories, while he himself would never find a path back.

But today, for the first time, he had heard someone else speak a name that had previously existed only in the broken fragments of his own memories.

Firmament.

That alone was enough.

Whether it was a world, a power, or merely an ancient name used to describe some unknown group of beings no longer mattered for now. At the very least, the name had truly appeared in the history of the Spirit Cloud Continent.

A faint ray of hope had opened within the darkness. His reason told him not to celebrate too soon, but even that tiny hope was enough to make his blood run hotter.

Hao Nhien drew a deep breath.

The spiritual qi from the spirit stones around him immediately stirred more strongly, flowing into his meridians as his cultivation method circulated.

After entering Foundation Establishment, the true qi in his dantian had undergone a qualitative transformation. What gathered there was no longer the thin gaseous energy of Qi Condensation, but condensed spiritual power approaching a liquid state. Each time he circulated his cultivation method, spiritual power flowed from his dantian through his meridians and throughout his body, steadier, deeper, and more enduring than before.

Within his Sea of Consciousness, the Spirit Sword had also become much more solid than it had been before Foundation Establishment.

It hovered amid the surrounding mist, its form increasingly distinct and its sharp aura more stable. The Spirit Sword belonged to his Divine Soul, while the Tieu Dao Sword was the physical weapon he wielded in the outside world. The two existed separately, but after reaching Foundation Establishment, Hao Nhien’s ability to mobilize his Divine Soul had clearly improved.

The battle in Black Wind Valley remained fresh in his mind.

The mid Foundation Establishment cultivator had possessed a higher cultivation level than his own. If they had fought somewhere else, face to face, with both sides fully prepared, Hao Nhien could not be certain he would have dealt with him so smoothly.

But Black Wind Valley had given him too many advantages.

He could read the wind and borrow its momentum. He knew which currents were about to shift, when the Black Wind would rebound from the cliffs, and when the terrain would create an opening for him to close the distance. When the opponent’s Divine Soul was disrupted by the Spirit Sword for that brief instant, Hao Nhien seized the final opening and drove the Tieu Dao Sword straight through his dantian.

The strike had been fast, precise, and decisive.

But Hao Nhien did not take that to mean he was stronger than a mid Foundation Establishment cultivator. Terrain, surprise, and the opponent’s misjudgment had all contributed to the outcome. On open ground, against an enemy already aware of his methods, or with another cultivator suppressing him from afar with lightning techniques, the result might have been very different.

Hao Nhien opened his eyes.

The Tieu Dao Sword rested across his knees, its blade reflecting the faint light of the surrounding spirit stones. He placed a hand on the hilt, then closed his eyes again.

The Spirit Sword appeared within his Sea of Consciousness.

Hao Nhien tried mobilizing his Divine Soul once. The Spirit Sword gave a faint tremor, and an invisible force immediately gathered according to his will, but before it could truly be released, he deliberately withdrew it.

A second time, then a third.

Each attempt was steadier than the last. The awkwardness he had felt during Qi Condensation was gone, and he no longer needed to focus every part of his mind merely to keep the Spirit Sword from dispersing.

After the third attempt, Hao Nhien stopped.

“That’s enough.”

The Spirit Sword was a Divine Soul technique. Its greatest value did not lie in repeated attacks, but in striking at a moment when the opponent was unprepared. One well-timed use could decide life and death, while overusing it would only give others a chance to adapt.

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Hao Nhien drew his attention back.

What he truly wanted to test tonight was not the Spirit Sword, but the second move of the Tieu Dao Sword Art.

Since entering Foundation Establishment, he had barely had time to sit down and properly examine his swordsmanship. He had broken through shortly after leaving the Spirit Beast Forest, in front of countless witnesses, then immediately traveled to the Western Wastes, formed a squad, fought, patrolled, delivered a message, and encountered an ambush in Black Wind Valley.

One event had followed another, leaving him almost no night that truly belonged to himself.

Tonight was different.

It was only a brief night inside the frontline camp. Danger still waited outside, and the name Firmament had just opened a question larger than anything he had ever known.

That was exactly why he needed to become stronger.

Hao Nhien took out the Tieu Dao Sword Manual.

The old sword manual rested in his hands, its pages yellowed with age and a few edges marked by small tears. At a glance, it looked no different from some ancient object long forgotten.

But Hao Nhien knew that what lay within had helped him survive more than once.

He opened it to the second page, drew a deep breath, and sent a stream of pure spiritual power into the paper while focusing his spiritual awareness.

It was completely different from his first comprehension.

Back then, the figure within the sword manual had been faint, no more than a distant wisp of smoke. This time, the yellowed page slowly began to glow. The ancient characters trembled faintly, almost as if coming alive, while a thin radiance spread outward and gradually filled his vision.

Hao Nhien felt his consciousness drawn into a silent void.

A figure in white appeared before him.

This time, the figure was far clearer.

White robes stirred lightly. Long hair moved in a wind that did not exist. The figure stood straight as a sword, and merely looking at him gave Hao Nhien the impression that the being before him was not an ordinary cultivator, but a blade that had endured countless years.

One Sword Tieu Dao.

Hao Nhien unconsciously held his breath.

The white-robed figure stood still, his right hand resting on the hilt of his sword. No killing intent erupted from him, nor did any overwhelming aura burst forth, yet in that instant, everything unnecessary seemed to disappear.

There were no stray thoughts and no path of retreat.

Only the sword strike that was about to fall.

The figure moved.

At first, very slowly. His shoulder turned, his center of gravity lowered, and force traveled from his foot through his waist and into his arm. His entire body seemed like a bow drawn to its absolute limit.

Then the sword descended.

Fast as lightning.

But Hao Nhien immediately realized that speed alone was not what made the strike terrifying. The sword seemed to have erased every unnecessary interval between raising the blade and bringing it down. There was no wide arc, no wasted motion, and no chaotic eruption of spiritual power. Body, sword, spiritual power, and intent all converged along a single line.

The blade fell.

A thread-thin line of light appeared along its path, then suddenly expanded into a long streak of sword radiance.

Within the comprehension, space itself seemed to split in two.

Shhk.

The sound did not reach Hao Nhien’s ears. It rang directly through his mind, so cold and sharp that he almost felt his thoughts themselves being severed.

The strike ended.

The white-robed figure sheathed his sword and slowly faded into nothingness.

Hao Nhien remained within the comprehension for a long time.

The second move was completely different from the first.

The first move was a thrust, using a single point, a single line, and a single instant to pierce through an opening and decide life or death. It was suited for closing distance, finding a weakness, and striking precisely where it mattered most.

The second was a slash.

It was not about crushing downward with brute force, but condensing everything into one single line of attack. Body, spiritual power, intent, and sword all had to move in the same direction and descend in the same instant.

One Sword Breaks Ten Thousand Arts.

Hao Nhien opened his eyes.

Sweat had already rolled down his forehead. He lowered his gaze to the Tieu Dao Sword in his hand, his eyes burning brighter than before.

This was exactly what he had been missing.

When facing third-rank beasts, the shell of the Fire Sand Mystic Turtle, the enormous body of the Python King, or defenses too thick for a simple thrust to break through, he had always lacked a true method for breaking the situation open.

A thrust could kill if it struck the right weakness, but what if the opponent exposed no weakness at all? What if what stood before him was thick armor, a hardened shell, a defensive artifact, or a formation talisman?

He needed a sword strike that could carve open the path ahead, condensed enough to break defenses, powerful enough to shatter an enemy’s formation, and fast enough that they could not simply evade it.

Hao Nhien nearly forgot where he was.

He rose, drawing the Tieu Dao Sword from its sheath.

The first slash fell, then the second, then the third.

Wrong.

He stopped and recalled the white-robed figure once more. It was not only about the arm. His center of gravity, the timing of his spiritual power, his body, and his intent all had to align.

Hao Nhien continued.

Ten strikes, then dozens more. Gradually, he stopped counting.

Time passed.

The mid-grade spirit stones around him lost their glow one after another. Their spiritual qi was drained away until they crumbled into pale dust across the floor.

Hao Nhien still did not stop.

His face grew increasingly pale. His body had yet to fully recover from the long journey and the battle in Black Wind Valley, yet once again he pushed it toward its limits.

His eyes, however, only grew brighter.

Every slash revealed another flaw. Sometimes it was his balance, sometimes the timing of his spiritual power, and sometimes the coordination between his body and intent.

He corrected them little by little, one strike after another.

Eventually, Hao Nhien closed his eyes completely.

In his perception, the chamber inside the Cave Dwelling gradually became silent. The Tieu Dao Sword in his hand no longer felt like something separate from his body. At first, it became an extension of his arm. Then it seemed to become an extension of his intent.

He no longer needed to consciously analyze every movement.

He only needed to raise the sword and bring it down.

Yet that simplicity was harder than anything that had come before.

The spiritual power in his meridians steadily dwindled. His arm grew heavy, and his breathing became strained. The wound on his shoulder, which had only throbbed faintly before, now burned with every exertion.

Yet Hao Nhien’s mind had never felt clearer.

At last, he slowly raised the sword once more.

There was no hurry.

His shoulders relaxed and his center of gravity sank. Spiritual power flowed from his dantian, through his meridians and into his arm before entering the Tieu Dao Sword. It did not erupt. It only continued to condense as his spiritual awareness focused entirely on the line before the blade.

Hao Nhien opened his eyes.

The sword descended.

Shhk!

A thin sword light flashed.

A deep impact followed immediately.

Boom!

The stone testing stele inside the Cave Dwelling shook violently.

A deep slash appeared from the top and extended nearly halfway down its length. Unlike the clean puncture left by One Sword, the edges of this wound had shattered outward into a long broken groove, scattering fragments of stone across the floor.

Hao Nhien stood still, staring at the mark.

After several breaths, the corners of his mouth slowly lifted.

“That’s it.”

His voice had turned hoarse with exhaustion, but it could not conceal his excitement.

“That’s the feeling.”

It was not complete.

Far from complete.

But he had found the path.

If One Sword was like a needle driven directly into the weakest point, then One Sword Breaks Ten Thousand Arts was a blade meant to cut straight through the defense in front of him.

Break artifacts, break armor, break formations.

One sword to carve open the way forward.

Hao Nhien stared at the scar on the stone stele and could not help laughing. The sound was not loud, but within the silence of the Cave Dwelling, it rang unusually clear.

It was not only because he had taken the first step toward mastering another killing technique.

For the first time in a very long while, he felt that the road ahead was no longer completely buried in darkness.

Firmament was no longer merely a vague name buried deep within his memories. It had appeared on the Spirit Cloud Continent.

The Western Wastes might be a trace.

The Heavenly Eye Tribe might be a clue.

And the sword in his hand was what would allow him to keep moving forward.

One day, if he truly wished to reach the place that had taken Anh Nhien from him, he would need cultivation, swordsmanship, companions, clues, time, and far more besides.

But tonight, at least, he had gained a little more hope.

Hao Nhien continued staring at the slash in the stone stele, as if trying to engrave the sensation of that strike deep into his memory.

Then his body suddenly swayed.

Excitement could no longer hide his true condition. His spiritual power was nearly exhausted, his Divine Soul was fatigued, and the wound on his shoulder had begun to ache more sharply.

The Tieu Dao Sword slipped from his hand.

Clang.

The blade struck the stone floor.

Hao Nhien braced one hand against the ground, but he could no longer support himself. His vision rapidly darkened.

Just before his consciousness completely faded, he thought he heard a faint sound from outside the Cave Dwelling, as if something had lightly touched the stone floor.

It did not sound like the wind.

Hao Nhien tried to raise his head, but his body no longer obeyed.

Darkness closed over him.

In the final instant before losing consciousness, what remained in his mind was neither the battle in Black Wind Valley nor the sword strike he had just unleashed.

It was the two words he had heard during the day.

Firmament.