“Oh? I didn’t expect you to break through right at the brink.” Mikarette sounded startled, as if the world had flipped like a page of ice.

“If I didn’t, I’d lose for sure!” Relief flooded me like warm light through frost, and luck felt like a spark catching dry tinder.

“You’re right. A moment ago, you had no chance at all. In that case… I’ll go all out too.” Her voice dropped like a blade into snow.

Her aura surged like a blizzard cresting a ridge. The temperature on the peak plunged by layers, and many floating swords froze like trapped swallows. I had to flood my body with Sword Aura, a sheath of wind and flame against winter’s teeth.

She’s too strong. Half-step into the Divine Realm, and she’s only the first floor’s warden. Eight more floors loom like shadowed cliffs.

The thought dragged me down like wet iron, because the blow to my confidence hit like hail. If the first floor of the Nine Cold Labyrinth has someone like Mikarette, what about the other eight?

No. Be cheerful or be crushed. The stronger the enemy, the more proof my edge is sharpening.

I shook my head hard, scattering doubt like snow from a branch. I gathered Sword Aura and slashed it toward Mikarette.

“Sword Qi Dance!”

Arc after arc of Sword Aura streaked toward her like silver fish, fast enough to carve the polished ground into splintered ice.

“Looks like I can’t take it easy anymore. As expected of a Sword Wielder—one breakthrough, and your power multiplies like spring grass after rain.” She spoke to herself, calm as a glacier.

She spread her hands, and the peak’s ice elements and chill poured into her like a tide. They condensed into a massive spear, which she flicked forward like a comet.

Boom! Boom! Boom!…

Every arc of the Sword Qi Dance got swallowed by that spear like sparks doused in sleet. No good. If this keeps up, we’ll freeze in stalemate. Right now, we’re evenly matched, two scales in perfect balance, and I need a stone to tilt them.

Thinking that, I stacked several speed-boosting sword arts onto myself, each one a lash of wind, then sprinted. I ran hard, loosing sword skills at Mikarette with every step like arrows from a storm.

If I keep this distance fight, it’ll drag on forever like winter night. I’ve got to get in close.

Mikarette seemed to read my intent like tracks in snow. Her offensive spells came faster and denser, a hailstorm of light. I nearly got tagged several times and couldn’t find a way in at all.

No choice. It’ll cost me, but let’s test a finisher.

I stopped dead and raised the Shattered Light Sword high, the blade a spike in the moon’s eye. I gathered every sword within the Sword Domain into one breath.

“Myriad Swords Unleashed!”

Hummm! Hummm!

A chorus of a thousand blades sang like crystal bells. They soared skyward, then plunged like meteors, falling toward Mikarette at air-splitting speed.

“Ring Mirror: Void and Real.”

Mikarette didn’t panic. She cast the defense with glacier calm. Countless half-real, half-illusory mirrors bloomed from empty air, encircling her like guardians, not a seam left.

Then—

Boom! Boom! Boom!…

Swords rained like a steel storm. At first, every strike met glass and died like foam on rock. But as the blades kept falling, the mirrors began to crack, one by one, a chain of breaking ice. In a blink, half her ring of mirrors lay in glittering shards.

“Now!”

While she scrambled to patch the broken mirrors, I stacked more speed into my limbs—until my body screamed like a bow at full draw.

I poured everything into a single dash and burst right in front of her.

“What?!”

She looked shocked. Too late. My Myriad Swords Unleashed was just a flare to blind the night. The real show starts now.

“Netherflow Rage Flame Slash!”

I condensed fire-aspected Sword Aura, and along the Shattered Light Sword a blade of energy over ten meters long roared to life. Flames raged like a furnace, and the ice around us melted into steam.

I spun at full speed, a firewheel over black ice, and swept the blazing blade. It cut everything in sight like dawn burning fog—Mikarette included.

“Damn it! Void Mirror!!”

At this range, anything she did arrived after the frost.

Crack—boom!

Every mirror shattered into snowdust. As for Mikarette—

“Ah!!!”

She took my full-force strike head-on and shot away like a cannonball, blasting through the peak’s icicles and ice sculptures like a dragon through reeds.

“Draw Sword Technique!”

I refused to think it was over. For all I know, she might stand up like last time, with only scratches under that frost.

I gathered Sword Aura again. In a draw stance, I slashed an arcing crescent that cut the air like a new moon.

“You again?!… Ah!!”

Mid-flight, she couldn’t dodge, only throw up a defense spell. She looked badly hurt. Her casting slowed like sap in winter. She failed to form the shield and took the slash again, clean and merciless.

“This is the last one!”

I still didn’t stop. I wrung the last drops of strength from my body, gripped the Shattered Light Sword with both hands, and raised it high. I madly drew in every thread of Sword Aura and energy within the Sword Domain, a whirlpool swallowing stars.

“Destruction Invisible Sword!”

A colossal formless sword loomed above the Shattered Light Sword, so vast its edges blurred like heat-haze. It emptied the Sword Domain in an instant.

This will be the final strike. The end of the blade trail.

I hewed downward, and the giant sword fell like a guillotine of night toward Mikarette.

Boom!!!

In the end, the giant sword sheared off half the mountaintop like slicing a cake of ice. Mikarette tumbled out of the Extreme Ice Mountain, vanishing into the white.

“Ha—ha—did I win?”

My strength ran dry like a lantern guttering out. I flopped onto the icy ground without dignity, the Shattered Light Sword beside me, and gasped for breath. Throwing out so many finishers tore my body like wind through paper.

If Mikarette shows up unscathed again, I can only surrender. Heaven help me, don’t let it come to that.

Time drifted past like snow.

Night fell in a blink, and I was still on the ground, asleep without knowing when I slipped under.

Midnight.

“A-choo!”

The cold yanked me awake, sharp as a needle. It was freezing, like knives of air, but I’d recovered a bit—enough to stand.

“Mm… where’s Mikarette?”

I stood and brushed ice and snow off my clothes, flakes scattering like glass. I looked around. The silence was wrong, too clean, not a hint of aura.

“Ahem… I’m here.”

No warning. Her voice came from behind me like a breath on the back of my neck.

“Gah!”

I almost blacked out and spun around. Then I saw her—and words froze on my tongue.

Mikarette looked wrecked. Wounds mottled her skin like cracked porcelain. Her dress was shredded, barely wearable. Her face was chalk-pale, and her breathing was thin, ready to break.

For some reason, guilt welled up in me like thaw water seeping through stone.