“So you brought two helpers, hmm…” Her voice brushed the air like cool dew on stone.

We’d barely arrived when Loreen appeared without warning, a shadow blooming like ink in water, and my heart jolted like a struck gong. Her gaze slid to Lingxiao and the Dual Daynight Tomes in her hands, slow as moonlight across a blade. “The Rule Book, is it? At last, something worth a little seriousness,” she said, calm as still water.

...

I snapped the bracelet back into the Shattered Light Sword and clamped down, a mountain’s weight settling on my chest and squeezing the breath thin.

“Dear Brother, this looks bad,” Lingsaki murmured, her words tight as a bowstring; “her power towers over us like a cliff.”

“Yeah,” I said, the heaviness pressing like a storm-swollen sky.

Lingxiao and Lingsaki’s faces hardened, clean and cold as frost on steel. Loreen only shook her head, lifted her right hand, and rang the bell at her wrist, the chime rippling out like a pebble in a pond. “You don’t need to defeat me,” she said, formal as a temple bell; “to pass this floor of the Divine Refinement Realm, just make one bell on my wrist fall.”

“If that’s the rule, we might actually win…” A fragile hope gleamed like a slit of light through cloud.

“Knock a bell down… Fine. We give it everything,” I said, planting resolve like a stake in the earth.

Even if the terms sounded simple, the sisters didn’t relax; the gap in strength gaped like a ravine, and plucking one bell felt like snatching a star from the river of night.

“We’ll fight together,” I told them, letting the emotion steady first, like anchoring a drifting boat; “there’s always a way.” Sword Intent spread from me like a dawn wind, thinning the crushing air.

“Mhm! Our first battle with dear Brother—no way we lose!” Lingsaki’s eyes flared like flags in a rising gale.

“Agreed. Lingsaki and I won’t let you down,” Lingxiao added, voice clear as a bell over snow.

They glanced at me, star-bright and unwavering, and nodded.

“Looks like you’re ready,” Loreen said, the words falling like a drumbeat that starts a hunt. “Then let’s begin.”

Whoosh—the moment the words faded, she vanished, speed cracking like lightning and heat-haze warping the space she left behind.

My gut lurched like a drum struck in panic. Danger poured through me like ice water. Instinct took over; I shoved Lingxiao and Lingsaki aside, seized the Shattered Light Sword, spun, and cut.

Clang!!

The blade smashed into something unyielding, solid as bedrock; the backlash thundered up my arm and numbed my grip, the sword almost slipping like a fish. I caught the recoil with gathered Sword Aura, a net tightening in the surge.

I looked up. Loreen’s face, beautiful and unreadable, filled my vision like a pale moon behind cloud. The Shattered Light Sword had met the Heavenly Lance tip to tip, sparks like meteors skittering off the clash.

...

I layered a power-boosting sword art over myself, heat licking my limbs like forge-fire. I tightened my grip, flicked upward, and knocked the Heavenly Lance aside like prying a nail. Then I fell back toward the sisters. “Lingxiao, Lingsaki—split up and watch for your moment. Harass her whenever you can.”

“Understood!” Lingxiao’s reply flew straight as an arrow.

“Disrupt her… we’ll try our best,” Lingsaki said, circling like gnats teasing a tiger.

They cast several magic shields over themselves, panes blooming like translucent leaves, then broke to either side and began to move, orbiting Loreen like wolves around a fire.

“Not a bad call,” Loreen said, a hint of approval glinting like sun on frost. She snapped the Heavenly Lance, and the air around her froze, brittle as winter glass. She ignored the sisters and charged me instead, a hawk stooping on a hare.

Lingxiao and Lingsaki’s attack spells unraveled before they could touch her, dissolving into raw elements like mist under noon sun—Earth Ward, most likely, deep as bedrock.

The Heavenly Lance hits absurdly hard; the Earth Ward holds even harder, like a cliff-face. Honestly, this is nasty—pressure dropping on me like a falling sky, even with Lingxiao and Lingsaki bracing my flanks.