Martial Peak

Chapter 2246, Heaven Severing Slash

Translator: Silavin & Danny

Translation Checker: PewPewLazerGun

Editor and Proofreader: Leo of Zion Mountain & Dhael Ligerkeys

Yang Kai hesitated for a moment, unable to decide if he should join Azure Sun Temple and enjoy the cool shade under this big tree, or if he should continue to stay independent and free.

“Go back and consider it for a few days, then give me an answer once you have made your mind,” Gao Xue Ting seemed to notice his dilemma, and instead of pushing him, she took the initiative to step back.

Yang Kai immediately breathed out a sigh of relief, “Many thanks, Elder Gao, regarding the matter of Facetless Profound Grass…”

“The price remains the same and we’ll keep an account of it. I’ve ordered someone to send you a thousand pieces for now,” Gao Xue Ting said lightly, “This account will be settled when you decide to become a disciple of our temple.”

“Al… right.” The corner of Yang Kai’s mouth twitched, thinking that the Azure Sun Temple really valued him if they were willing to use such a method to keep him with them.

Then, there was a long period of silence again.

At a certain moment, Gao Xue Ting opened her beautiful eyes once again, “You may go. The person who will deliver the Facetless Profound Grass is already waiting outside, just talk to him yourself.”

“Many thanks, Elder Gao!” Yang Kai turned and left after giving thanks to Gao Xue Ting.

When he was outside of the secluded cave mansion, Yang Kai saw a middle-aged man waiting for him.

This man looked about forty years old, but his cultivation was only at the First-Order Dao Source Realm. This level of cultivation may be satisfying in some places such as Maplewood City, since all the Old Ancestors in the various major families were just at this level.

However, this was quite lacking in Azure Sun Temple, so obviously this middle-aged man’s aptitude wasn’t the best.

Ever since Yang Kai came out from Maplewood City and stepped into this journey of his, he had seen countless rising stars and young talents, so his vision and experience were much broader than before.

As soon as the middle-aged man saw Yang Kai walking out of Gao Xue Ting’s cave mansion, he hurriedly put a smiley face on and cupped his fists, “This one has brought a thousand pieces of Facetless Profound Grass by the order of Elder Chen. I wonder if your excellency is Senior Brother Yang Kai?”

“En!” Yang Kai nodded.

The man’s eyes lit up and he praised, “I’ve heard about Brother Yang for a long time. Seeing you today, you really live up to your name.”

“What? Am I famous in Azure Sun Temple?” Yang Kai touched his nose.

The middle-aged man said with a smile, “I’m afraid Brother Yang has been training hard in isolation these days, so he has yet to hear the news from outside. The name of Brother Yang is not just widely spread in Azure Sun Temple, but also across the entire Southern Territory.”

“Is there such a thing?” Yang Kai’s face turned solemn as he suddenly had a bad premonition…

The man did not realize the change in Yang Kai’s expression as he continued to bootlick, “The news about Brother Yang refining the Extraordinary Treasure Pill in the Four Seasons Realm and overwhelming Wu Chang from the Heavenly Martial Holy Land has shocked the whole world. Brother Yang is extremely famous now…”

When he got to this point, he suddenly found that Yang Kai’s face had turned ugly, and immediately figured out the problem. With a smile, he stopped his flattery and spoke after giving out a cough, “Brother Yang, these are the Facetless Profound Grass that Elder Chen asked me to deliver. Would you like to count them?”

“It’s fine,” Yang Kai reached for the Space Ring that was passed to him and thanked that man with his fist cupped before turning around to leave.

Although Yang Kai had predicted that some of his secrets could no longer be hidden after his involvement in the incident in the Four Seasons Realm, he did not expect that the news would spread so fast and so wide. It was outside of his predictions.

If so, he should seriously consider Gao Xue Ting’s proposal to join Azure Sun Temple.

With the umbrella of protection of Azure Sun Temple, he could certainly avoid a lot of troubles in the future while without it, he would probably be hunted when he travelled around Star Boundary.

The cultivators in the Four Seasons Realm already knew that the Extraordinary Treasure Pills were all gone; however, matters related to the Extraordinary Treasure Pill were quite sensational. Some would still come and demand Yang Kai hand over the Extraordinary Treasure Pills he had…

The more he thought about it, the more frustrated he got. When he returned to the secluded cave mansion on Purple Bamboo Peak’s mountainside, his mood gradually stabilized.

There was no need to be worried about this for now. If such a thing really happened, he would just have to deal with it then.

Moreover, he was not someone to be trifled with. Despite his cultivation apparently not having progressed since the Four Seasons Realm closed, his Soul had grown significantly inside the Divine Ascension Mirror World. Any average cultivator would not be his match.

Yang Kai would only have troubles if an Emperor came to seek him out.

But even if it was a First-Order Emperor Realm Master, couldn’t he just run away if he couldn’t defeat them?

When he thought of this, his mood brightened up and a feeling of pride kicked in. Yang Kai overflowed with indescribable self-confidence, which made him feel a lot more relaxed.

After he sat down cross-legged again, he took out the Insect Enslavement Bracelet and threw the thousand Facetless Profound Grass into it before stuffing them all into the jar which contained the Soul Devouring Insects.

According to the Exotic Insect Record, due to its medicinal scent that had extremely stimulating effects on the Soul Devouring Insects, Facetless Profound Grass was the best herb to promote their evolution.

This spirit grass was also very effective in helping the growth of the Soul Devouring Insects.

All of a sudden, a mad burst of cracking sounds came from within the jar, like the galloping noises of a golden-armoured horse.

After listening for a while, Yang Kai ignored it.

There was no way for him to interfere with the evolution of the Soul Devouring Insects. Only time would tell the final results of their evolution.

Withdrawing his Divine Sense, Yang Kai took out another object and placed it in his hand to study attentively.

It was another Emperor Artifact of the Insect Emperor, the Soul Splitting Saber!

Before entering the Divine Ascension Mirror World, Yang Kai never thought that the Soul Splitting Saber was actually a Soul-type Emperor Artifact. If it had not been brought into the Divine Ascension Mirror World with him, Yang Kai would not have realized this until a long time later.

Yang Kai would not consider refining it if it was just an ordinary Emperor Artifact.

These days, he had numerous tricks to handle his enemies. Without even mentioning all of the abilities he had personally created for himself, Yang Kai also possessed two Emperor Artifacts, the Annihilation Thunder Bead and the Myriads Swords. Unfortunately, the Myriads Sword had to be returned to the Qin Family when he went back to Maplewood City.

However, one could not digest well when being stuffed with too much good food. This was one of Yang Kai’s concerns before, so he had not planned to refine the Soul Splitting Saber previously. On top of that, he had not been strong enough to do this anyways.

But everything changed since he now knew this was a Soul-type Emperor Artifact. Yang Kai needed to refine it now.

Having made up his mind a while ago, after he settled matters regarding the Soul Devouring Insects, Yang Kai began to refine the Soul Splitting Saber.

He thought that refining such an Emperor Artifact would certainly take up a lot of effort and energy, since even the Insect Enslavement Bracelet had taken him a full whole month to refine.

But, contrary to what Yang Kai originally thought, refining the Soul Splitting Saber was easier than the Insect Enslavement Bracelet.

In less than half a month, Yang Kai has broken the seal on the Soul Splitting Saber, erased the Soul Imprint of the Insect Emperor, and left his own Soul Imprint in its place.

After thinking it over, Yang Kai felt that there were probably two reasons for this situation. First, his Spiritual Energy was strong enough to shorten the refining time, second, the Soul Splitting Saber was once fused with his own Soul Avatar and fought together with him against enemies in the Divine Ascension Mirror World. This experience had strengthened the connection between the Soul Splitting Saber and himself, allowing him to refine it in just half a month.

However… Like with all artifacts, Yang Kai was unable to exert this Soul Splitting Saber’s maximum power even if he had successfully refined it. In order to do that, a long period of nourishing and adapting was necessary.

Yang Kai sent the Soul Splitting Saber into his Knowledge Sea and then appeared before it in his Soul Avatar form. Next, he spared no energy to cultivate a certain Secret Technique with it.

This Secret Technique was learned from Tian Yan.

During his last days in the Divine Ascension World, Yang Kai learned a lot from Senior Tian Yan.

Tian Yan was a Great Emperor after all, and although he did not have a physical body, it was still a simple matter for him to teach Yang Kai some things at his level.

Tian Yan was extremely generous with Yang Kai and passed him almost all of his accumulated knowledge and experiences in the cultivation of the Soul.

However, in terms of Secret Techniques, Yang Kai only learnt one from Tian Yan.

Tian Yan once said to him that the quality of the Secret Techniques one possessed was more important than the quantity. If Yang Kai mastered just one extraordinary Secret Technique to an incredible height, he could still be invincible. On the other hand, learning many Secret Techniques to a sub-par level would only prove useless. All roads lead to one path, the same was true for Secret Arts and Secret Techniques.

As such, he only taught one Secret Technique to Yang Kai.

This Secret Technique was called the ‘Heaven Severing Slash’!

During normal times, Yang Kai would cultivate this Secret Technique by nourishing his weapon with his Spiritual Energy; then, when he needed to use this Secret Technique, Yang Kai could unleash all of the accumulated energy in his weapon in a single strike, resulting in an almost certain-kill technique.

Tian Yan did not have a Soul-type artifact, so he only used this Secret Technique to nourish a weapon he had formed from his own Spiritual Energy.

On top of that, it was ten thousand years ago, when he was just an ordinary Emperor Realm Master, that he created this Secret Technique.

Tian Yan today did not need this kind of Secret Technique. He was a Great Emperor and could control Principle Strength to a high degree. No one in that world could stand against him in a fight, so why would he still need special Secret Techniques?

Therefore, he passed this skill down to Yang Kai.

Although the Heaven Severing Slash would only have a miraculous effect on the first strike delivered by the Soul-type artifact it was cultivated with, and subsequent attacks could only exert the original power of that artifact, the Soul Splitting Saber itself was an Emperor Artifact, so even if Yang Kai could not release its maximum power, few would be able to withstand such a strike given his current strength.

With the support of this Secret Technique, the Heaven Severing Slash, even an Emperor Realm Master could be severely injured if they were taken off guard.

This was a life-saving, certain-kill trump card, therefore Yang Kai spared no effort to cultivate it.

Inside his Knowledge Sea, Yang Kai’s Soul Avatar revealed itself and continuously sent Spiritual Energy towards the Soul Splitting Saber, causing the flames around him to dance about madly.

With every crash of the flaming waves, the Soul Splitting Saber seemed to glow faintly and its aura would increase ever so slightly. This increase was almost unnoticeable, but if it continued to build like this, it would reach an astonishing intensity in time.

The first strike from this technique would definitely be Earth-shaking!

From time to time, Yang Kai opened his mouth to blow out a pure breath from his Soul towards the Soul Splitting Saber, tempering the strength within.

As the days passed, Yang Kai stayed in the cave mansion on Purple Bamboo Peak and cultivated the Heaven Severing Slash with his Soul Splitting Saber.

But he also spent some time checking in on Hua Qing Si and Zhang Ruo Xi in the Small Sealed World.

Ever since he gave the last Extraordinary Treasure Pill to Hua Qing Si and she consumed it unceremoniously, this woman’s attitude towards Yang Kai had turned around completely. Although she did not act at Yang Kai’s beck and call, she no longer rejected him directly as she used to and was much more accommodating.