The ancient bronze longsword embedded in the wasteland let out wave after wave of desolate sword cries. Its blade trembled violently. Then, after one long wail, the bronze sword transformed into a handsome man clad in shattered armor.
His bare arms were lined with firm muscles and covered in countless tiny scars. His long hair hung in wild disarray. Yet his eyes alone held a love so deep it cut to the bone, fixed on the woman bound by vines upon the flowering tree.
“Ho... Si...”
The man forced himself up with the last bit of strength left in him and staggered toward the flower tree. But before he could take more than a few steps, he collapsed from exhaustion. So he pressed both hands into the wasteland and crawled through the dirt toward the tree. Other than that peaceful-faced woman, everything else in his eyes had turned to nothing.
That was right. In the final moment, the Eighth-Tier War Prayer named Hesi had exchanged back her husband's soul and fused it into her own true artifact, merging the two souls into one.
But such an act had still defied the law of life and death. So, to keep her husband alive, Hesi offered up her own power and life as a sacrifice, forcibly severing her bond with her Soulbound Artifact. One life for one life.
In the end, it was still a tragedy.
After the fusion, her husband gained battle power enough to rival an Eighth-Tier Prayer Cultivator. But like Hesi, he had lost the only one he truly loved. He no longer had any reason to keep living in this world. In despair, the man transformed into a dragon and used his own essence blood to build this independent space, hiding it from the Heavenly Dao. After that, he reconnected with the departed Hesi, hoping that before they both completely faded into nothingness, he could preserve the most beautiful image of her in his memory—
When the woman in white gauze saw him crawling forward with such difficulty, even her icy snow-like eyes showed a faint trace of struggle. But if a true artifact capable of becoming a dragon was not under her control, the threat would be far too great. Besides, this independent world was about to collapse. If that troublesome person from the Qizhan Empire noticed her aura here, things would inevitably get annoying.
At that thought, every last trace of pity in her snow eyes vanished.
Her Qi Energy spread out, and the surrounding air once again turned cold enough to pierce the bone. At the same time, an icy blue radiance instantly shone down from the void, trying to forcibly erase the consciousness within the true artifact, along with the others nearby who, to her, did not even qualify as ants.
Boom!
Under that freezing might, Li Rui, Hua Zhaoxue, and the others, including the man crawling with difficulty, all felt as if a crushing weight had slammed down on them. It was as though every meridian in their bodies had been completely frozen in an instant.
Hua Zhaoxue and Nie Wangqing had not yet recovered from the shock of seeing the back of the white-gauze woman earlier, when they were immediately forced heavily to their knees by that supreme freezing pressure. Their gazes could not lift upward even the slightest bit.
As if countless buckets of ice water had been poured over him, Li Rui kept his head lowered, yet still desperately shielded the unconscious bodies of Bai Ziting and Li Yuanqian. With all his strength, he forced his gaze to the right. Then he saw his elder sister, who had always doted on him the most. Her face was deathly pale, and with Zheng Biao supporting her, she was barely clinging to the last thread of consciousness.
Not just them. Hua Zhaoxue, Nie Wangqing, and the dragon-turned man were all the same.
At that moment, what felt colder to Li Rui than the pain in his body was his soul—
Countless images flashed through his mind.
Right. The world really was this unfair.
Even if a very small number of men were granted the qualification to wield Qi Energy, compared to everything else, it was no more than a mayfly trying to shake a tree.
If that dragon had defeated him in a male form, then even if he suffered, he would never have felt this unwillingness. Because at the very least, deep in his soul, it would have planted the belief that a man could also become unmatched.
But—
In despair, Li Rui shed tears of unwillingness and regret. There was guilt toward his sister, toward Bai Ziting, toward Hua Zhaoxue, and the others. There was also despair at the cruelty of reality.
But before that white-gauze woman, a being as lofty as the heavens...
what did his unwillingness even amount to...?
—
—
“This kind of conduct... is unworthy of the bearing of the strong.”
Amid that absolute pressure, a calm and ethereal voice suddenly rang out.
As the voice sounded, all the oppressive force on everyone vanished completely. In its place came a comfort like a spring breeze brushing over them.
A figure just as white slowly stepped forward under the crowd’s stunned gazes. His long robe drifted lightly, carrying an elegant, wind-like grace untouched by the mortal world.
“Tian... You...” Tian You looked at the disbelief in Hua Zhaoxue’s eyes, smiled slightly, and gently stroked her smooth hair before continuing forward, until he came to Li Rui’s side and slowly stopped.
Looking at the emotionally shaken Li Rui, he gave a light smile and nodded. Then, while Li Rui still had not come back to his senses, Tian You bent down and picked up the iron sword Li Rui had dropped earlier.
The moment he gripped the sword, a trace of sharpness appeared within Tian You’s calm aura.
He turned, stepped forward, and held the longsword horizontally before him. A faint silver glow surfaced along the blade. His violet eyes met those snow eyes now clearly tinged with surprise.
“Please instruct me.”
