“So that’s a battle at the Pinnacle of Origin Realm—like two storms ripping the sky?!”

From afar, an Origin Realm expert swallowed hard, like sand grinding in a dry throat. “We’re Origin Realm too, yet we can only fortify ourselves and pray not to be swept up.”

“Yeah. The Pinnacle’s might is a mountain pressing down, not something we can imagine.”

“Especially the one called Xinuo. She doesn’t revert to her Sword Spirit form, and she brings no Origin Artifact, yet she suppresses Lady Xiyue at full force. That’s terrifying.”

“Right. Her grasp of the Primordial Source flows like a great river, far stronger than Lady Xiyue’s stream. Will there be any chance to win?”

“Relax. Lady Xiyue still hides aces under her sleeve, like stars behind clouds. Even if she can’t win, she won’t lose.”

“I hope so. No wonder, under Lady Xiyue’s lead, we labored for years and still can’t open the Worldgate. The Prime Realm hides stronger beings, like shadows behind the sun.”

“Xinuo, you’re still that hard to deal with.”

The dust thinned like mist after rain. Xiyue caught the giant Origin sword with one hand, crushed it like ice in a fist. She broke the sword formation in one sweeping motion, then brushed the powdery grit from her robes like leaves off a stream.

Her movements looked light as drifting petals, but they cost blood and breath. I saw her left hand tremble, a reed shivering in a cold wind.

“Right back at you.”

Seeing Xiyue gather for another assault, frustration rose in my chest like a tight drum. This would drag on forever. I do enjoy clashing with evenly matched foes, but after our earlier exchanges, and after feeling out her current power, my interest had waned like embers dying.

“Judging by your ‘too much trouble’ face, Xinuo, you don’t want to fight?” Xiyue asked, her voice cool as moonlight on stone.

“Mm. Keeping this up solves nothing and stretches like fog at dawn.”

“Patience. I’ve got plenty, like a winter lake. Besides, I’m not satisfied yet.”

Her words fell, and her Primordial Source surged like a tidal bore. A demonic purple moon dropped into the sky, cold and regal. The Source wind howled and raked the heavens, and even the Worldgate shuddered, like a door in a storm.

She was going all in. A prickle of caution rose like thorns under skin. I needed to stay sharp, or I’d trip in the gutter beneath a bridge.

“Moonfall Blossoms.”

Around the purple moon, countless petals of Primordial Source drifted down like a red rain. They whirled on the wind, a shower of beauty hiding teeth. Origin Sword Qi gathered along Xiyue’s blade; she split into several streaks of sword light and vanished into the petal-storm, like a fox slipping into flowering fog.

My Sword Intent reached its pinnacle and swept out like a hawk’s gaze. Every move of hers fell within my forecast. Dodging or guarding was a matter of angles, not desperation.

Yet passive defense gnawed like a termite. I needed the initiative. We were neck and neck; outright victory was a mirage. Better to find a chance to bind her.

I swung the World Sword several times and pushed Xiyue back, carving out two or three precious seconds. My eyes rose to that unsettling purple moon, a bruise in the sky, and a plan clicked like flint—if she called a moon, I’d raise a sun to balance it.

“Daylight Sun.”

I gave her no chance to interrupt. I gathered vast Origin Sword Qi in the firmament, forging a blazing golden sun that burned like noon over a desert.

As my counterattack ignited, swords of Primordial Source bloomed around the golden sun and streaked toward Xiyue like meteors from a radiant crown.

Now she had to weather my storm and watch the sky. The tide turned, a wind angling my sails.

“…Evernight: Shattered Moon.”

Harried by blades from every direction, she blocked me, then detonated the purple moon like a star breaking. BOOM!

The moon’s Primordial power burst out like a void-tide, erasing everything nearby into nothingness. Only the Worldgate stood like an ancient rock in a wave. My golden sun cracked in half, its light leaking like molten gold.

It took real work to slip that cataclysm, like running through falling cliffs. I broke free of the blast and found Xiyue had vanished, gone like a shadow after dawn.

The rich violet Source still hung in the air. It rallied as if summoned and condensed into a massive surge of Origin Sword Qi, a mountain of edge.

“Dark Sever.”

With a low whisper, the giant blade torrent charged me like a cleaving storm. Behind it, Xiyue became dozens, then hundreds of slashes, a rain of cutting arcs.

Trouble. Dodging was too late. Taking it head-on would be like standing against an avalanche. No time to think; I forged two Origin Swords, sprang back, and hurled them forward like twin comets.

The two Origin Swords swelled mid-flight, giants born from sparks. They smashed into the oncoming blade surge, and another inferno roared out, shredding the battered space back into dust.

Xiyue’s slashes ripped through the drifting ash, a silver squall close as breath. I was ready; I unleashed the Reversal Sword again and again, turning each strike like waves flipped by the moon.

I seized the moment and rewove the Primordial structure inside the half-golden sun still hanging above, its heart like gears shifting.

Now. I slid back a good distance, slipping her relentless pursuit like a fish through reeds. Overhead, the half sun melted into countless Origin Swords. They poured down, encircled her, and locked into a cage of blades, a lattice like iron vines.

This wasn’t a simple formation. It cost me thought, patience, and edge. Xiyue wouldn’t break out soon; I could hold her for a dozen, maybe twenty days, a winter in steel.

Inside that Sword Cage, her movements would bind like ankles in snow, and even her strength would dim like a flame in rain.

“…Damn it.”

She struck the Sword Cage again and again, sparks flicking off like fireflies. Nothing. She gritted her teeth and shot me a glare sharp as a thorn. She didn’t beg; she wouldn’t waste breath on hollow pleas.

“Keeping this up is pointless. Reflect in there. I’m heading back.”

Words wouldn’t bridge this gulf. Better to leave than let time drip away like water from a cracked jar.

I turned without another glance, slipped past the Worldgate, and returned to the Prime Realm, like stepping from night into a quieter dawn.

“Lady Xiyue, are you alright?!”

Once Xinuo left, several Origin Realm experts rushed over like birds drawn to a shaken tree. They peered at Xiyue inside the cage, worry clouding their faces like mist.

They wanted to help, but seeing Xiyue hemmed in by blades, they knew any aid would be clumsy stones in a river.

“I’m fine.”

She shook her head, a cool gesture like frost on glass. News reached her of Wilsar’s defeat on the Northern Abyss Continent, a shadow falling across distant waters.

At least they escaped, carrying the Basiloth Empire’s wealth and fighters at Law Realm and above, like ants carrying their queen. The loss wasn’t fatal—only a few footholds gone, and open growth was never their path.

The Mizumi Clan might hunt them later, like hounds on a trail. Survival mattered more than banners.

“It’s time to send Wilsar to seek that one’s help.”

She murmured, voice soft as winter wind, and sent her orders to Wilsar along with a small thing through the void, a seed across a fence.

No one enters the Prime Realm before the Worldgate opens, a law like iron. Yet for Xiyue at the Pinnacle of Origin Realm, sending one or two items across is easy, like tossing pebbles over a wall—so long as they aren’t ‘precious’ enough to draw Xinuo’s eye.

Prime Realm.

“Sis, how is it?”

FrostyLily Dream stopped her work, unease fluttering like a sparrow in her chest.

“Same as always. Nothing special besides a bout with Xiyue.”

Conservatively, the Sword Cage could hold Xiyue for half a month, like ice that won’t thaw fast. The Worldgate’s seals could last a year or more, even with Xiyue battering daily like waves on cliffs.

In other words, I could step away, breathe, and taste life again, like tea after a long march. Huh. Servant and the others actually returned to the Mizumi Clan.

I hadn’t seen Servant in a while, and the ache of missing throbbed like a quiet string. “Leave the Worldgate be for now,” I told FrostyLily Dream, voice calm as cloud shadow. “As long as Xiyue refuses to quit, anything we do is a bandage on a broken dam. I’m heading to the Mizumi Clan. Do as you like.”

“Hey—hey?! Sis, don’t abandon me like a stray! I’m coming too!”