Martial Cultivator

Autumn raised her sword and walked forward. She intended to kill Chen Chao, but not because of the threat contained within the Demon Emperor’s glance. Rather, she understood very clearly that the greatest obstacle facing the demon race was Chen Chao. No matter what, Chen Chao could not be allowed to live.

Chen Chao watched Autumn walk toward him and did not find it surprising. What would happen between the two of them had already been decided the first time they met.

Yu Xiyi took a deep breath, brandished his sword, and stepped in front of Chen Chao. Pressing a hand against the sheathed flying sword Wild Grass, Yu Xiyi lightly patted the hilt and said with a smile, ”It’s this woman again. We brothers can’t lose to the same woman twice, otherwise that punk will laugh at us for the rest of our lives.”

Wild Grass let out a faint hum, as though responding to Yu Xiyi.

Yu Xiyi feigned surprise and said, ”What? You’re saying that whether I can beat her or not, that punk will laugh at me for the rest of my life?”

”Damn it, what kind of friend did I make?”

Yu Xiyi cursed under his breath, but then he laughed. ”In that case, it doesn’t matter. Whether I can beat her or not, it makes no difference.”

Standing behind him, Chen Chao heard every word of the fellow’s muttering and said helplessly, ”Great Sword Immortal Yu, can you actually do it or not?”

Yu Xiyi did not reply. In the next instant, he had already unleashed a sword strike!

On Autumn’s path forward, a great rain of sword qi suddenly came into being. It was like summertime, when farmers were drying grain and suddenly saw dark clouds gathering on the horizon. Before they had time to prepare, a torrential downpour descended upon the world.

Such rain was helplessly referred to by farmers as an easterly rain.

The speed of Yu Xiyi’s sword at this moment was exactly like that, giving Autumn no time at all to react.

Among those at the end of Nepenthe, after Autumn began learning the sword, Yu Xiyi had actually been the one who found it most outrageous. You were a perfectly good demon princess, so why were you learning sword dao?

Just because you read a few sword manuals, did you really think you could understand it?!

Autumn raised her head and glanced at the vast rain of droplets falling from above. The flying sword in her hand drew out a streak of sword light before her, after which the sword light scattered and met the rain filling the sky.

In terms of sword dao cultivation alone, Autumn’s realm as a great sword immortal naturally could not compare to that of the young great sword immortal before her. Yet at this moment, she stubbornly wanted to use her own sword dao cultivation to compete with Yu Xiyi’s.

It was as though she had returned to her younger years, when she had insisted on competing with her consort mother over some trivial matter.

She had not done such things for many years.

She did not know why such thoughts had arisen again today.

Yu Xiyi let out a cold laugh. With his thoughts stirring, sword qi instantly filled heaven and earth. The great rain of sword qi suddenly descended, every raindrop a peerlessly sharp flying sword.

As countless flying swords fell at this moment, their killing power was so terrifying that scarcely anyone in the world could compare to it!

The scattered sword light released by Autumn held out for a moment before dense cracks began to appear throughout it, like a mirror shattered yet not completely broken.

The next moment, a booming sound rang out. Yu Xiyi’s countless raindrops tore open a gap and surged through it all at once.

They all poured down toward Autumn’s head!

To Autumn, this was actually an extremely dangerous situation, yet this demon princess remained unconcerned. She then unleashed several more sword strikes in succession. Several streaks of sword light appeared one after another, and streams of sword qi once again flowed in all directions above her head. It was as though Autumn had forcibly carved out several new channels within a rushing river, diverting the sword qi into those channels and thereby preventing the river from continuing to pour down.

Watching this scene from afar, Chen Chao could not help but nod. In terms of sword dao cultivation alone, Yu Xiyi undoubtedly surpassed Autumn, without the slightest question. Among the sword cultivators of the current age, only the Sword Sect’s Sect Master could be said to firmly suppress Yu Xiyi. Whether it was the other great sword immortals or those hidden Fuyun sword immortals who never emerged, in Chen Chao’s view, if one spoke solely of sword dao cultivation rather than cultivation realm, they were probably all inferior to Yu Xiyi.

Yu Xiyi simply had not yet opened up an entirely new sword path of his own.

However, while Autumn might not be a match for Yu Xiyi in sword dao, she surpassed him in other aspects. For example, in her judgment of a situation and her reactions, the demon princess was much quicker. Her earlier decision had been incomparably correct and nearly the best possible choice. There was a sense of using four ounces to move a thousand pounds in her actions. With ease, she had already neutralized Yu Xiyi’s sword qi without paying much of a price.

But after his sword was neutralized, Yu Xiyi was not angered in the slightest. This was not his first battle against Autumn. He already knew that this demon princess was not easy to deal with. Thus, after that sword strike, endless sword qi had already condensed into a flying sword above Autumn’s head, hanging there silently.

Autumn sensed the pure and razor-sharp sword intent. Just as she was about to make a decision, Chen Chao suddenly smiled from across the way and said, ”Autumn, if I had known this day would come, I should have killed you back in the desolate north.”

Autumn frowned. Her mind wavered for an instant, though she recovered almost immediately. Even so, it was already too late. The flying sword hanging above her head descended at that moment.

Left with no choice, Autumn sent out a palm toward the sky. Endless demonic qi spread from her palm, blocking the descending flying sword. At the same time, she tightened her grip on the flying sword Autumn Beyond the Tower and slashed at the flying sword formed from condensed sword qi.

The flying sword shattered. Countless strands of sword qi exploded apart here, but at that moment the demonic qi and sword qi within Autumn’s body rushed into the same meridian, causing her face to turn somewhat pale.

Ever since reaching the realm of great sword immortal, the two forces within Autumn had long been clearly separated, each remaining in its own domain without interfering with the other. But in her haste, the two auras had crossed paths, and that was not a good thing for Autumn.

And the root cause of all this had not been Yu Xiyi’s sword at all, but Chen Chao’s words.

That young martial artist was simply too adept at reading expressions and judging situations. In the briefest instant, he had spoken at the moment when she was most susceptible, disrupting her concentration.

What Chen Chao had done was actually somewhat forced.

He knew exactly what Yu Xiyi was capable of. If he did nothing, then if Yu Xiyi’s luck was poor, he might very well die here today. If his luck was better, he would probably still end up defeated. No matter what, once Autumn got past Yu Xiyi, the unlucky one would be Chen Chao himself.

Even if not for Yu Xiyi’s sake, Chen Chao still had to do something.

By now, Yu Xiyi was already charging forward with sword in hand. When Chen Chao had spoken earlier, he had felt nothing. He understood Chen Chao’s intentions. But that was only because it was Chen Chao. Had it been anyone else, Yu Xiyi would probably have flown into a rage.

Using sword qi to clear the path, Yu Xiyi arrived before Autumn in the blink of an eye. With a casual upward sweep of his sword, he shattered the demonic qi around her, then slashed down at Autumn.

At this moment, he was exploiting the fact that Autumn had yet to regain her footing.

Wild Grass descended, sword qi erupting everywhere. It was like a green moon falling into the mortal world, yet it was soon stained with a layer of autumn colors.

A touch of dark yellow appeared before Yu Xiyi’s eyes.

In an instant, he was drawn into a curtain of autumn rain. It was as though he now stood beside a window, watching the endless autumn rain outside. The fallen leaves had long since lost their golden color and become dim and dull, silently enduring the impact of the raindrops.

The two flying swords met, sword qi grinding against sword qi, while sparks flew between their edges.

Wild Grass was the Hundred Year Sword of Sword Qi Mountain, representing the highest standard of flying swords in the current age. As for the Autumn Beyond the Tower before it, no one knew when it had been forged; it was difficult to say whether it even belonged to this era. But even if its sharpness was inferior to Wild Grass, it was certainly not inferior by much.

They were evenly matched.

Even if her flying sword held no advantage, Autumn still possessed a body full of cultivation.

The two flying swords collided hundreds of times in an instant. Countless strands of sword qi were born, only to dissipate a moment later. They devoured and shredded one another, and in places invisible to the naked eye, this had become a slaughterhouse of sword qi.

But as time passed, even Autumn, who had dragged Yu Xiyi into her own dao domain, was steadily losing ground.

When it came to facing an opponent using sword dao cultivation alone, she truly was no match.

”Little girlie, do you really think that just because you practiced the sword for a few days and happened to stumble into becoming some great sword immortal, you’ve figured out sword dao? Let this sword immortal tell you, you’re still far too lacking!”

One could not really blame Yu Xiyi for being angry. Sword cultivators of the world, Yu Xiyi included, all regarded sword cultivation as something sacred and inviolable. They treated sword dao and their flying swords as though they were their very lives. As for Autumn, it was obvious that she merely treated sword dao as a means to an end and did not truly care about it. That was what angered Yu Xiyi the most.

Autumn remained silent. Even while fighting Yu Xiyi, she had never really regarded this so-called great sword immortal as someone worthy of her attention. The only person she had ever cared about was that young martial artist.

Since she was destined to be unable to surpass Yu Xiyi in sword dao, Autumn’s expression remained unchanged as vast demonic qi began surging into the sky behind her. The might of a Demon Lord was about to reveal itself.

Yu Xiyi’s scalp tingled. It had been the same on the walls of Northern Frontier City last time, he had not been able to withstand it very well. As for this time, he had no idea whether he could endure it.

But after gritting his teeth, Yu Xiyi steeled his resolve. If he had to try, then he would try!

It was not because he insisted on fighting over pride. It was because Chen Chao was behind him. It was not that he feared being mocked by that fellow. Rather, he feared that if he proved incapable, that kid would truly lose his life here.

Yu Xiyi did not want to watch Chen Chao die, nor did he want Chen Chao to die because of his own incompetence.

As for Chen Chao, he was not actually watching this battle at all. Instead, he raised his head and looked at the sky. The outcome of today had never depended on Yu Xiyi’s side. It lay between the Demon Emperor and the Divine Daughter.

The victor between those two was what truly mattered.