Spirit Ruin, Sword Coffin, Blind Swordsman

The sun dipped below the horizon, painting the sky with a bloody hue.

Li Guanqi sat cross-legged on the lone mountain, unnoticed by anyone. His chest rose and fell in a steady rhythm, wisps of white qi entering his body through his nostrils. Three Spirit- Gathering Arrays were laid out beside him, with spirit stone powder swirling around him.

A loud crack sounded in his mind. His eyes sprang open, and one-cun-long bolts of lightning shot out from them.

A smile spread across his face. His bottleneck to the Illusory Refinement Realm was loosening. His translucent primordial soul glowed faintly—it just needed a heavenly tribulation to fully metamorphose.

Suddenly, he heard guqin music, as faint as a mosquito’s buzz.

Whoosh!

Li Guanqi shot to his feet and turned to look behind him, squinting.

The person playing the guqin had to be Cang Lu.

Cang Lu… Is he trying to lure me out of the city? What does he want?

The guqin music seemed targeted at him alone; no one in the Great Profound Sword Sect reacted. He didn’t dwell on how Cang Lu’s music could pass through the sect’s array boundary.He stepped forward, and when he reappeared, he had already left the Central Prefecture’s mountains and Heavenly Cloud City behind.

He stood in the wild countryside, surrounded by lush grassy plains. Rolling hills seemed to connect in a straight line, with the occasional demonic beast roar echoing from the mountains.

Li Guanqi extended his divine consciousness to cover thousands of zhang around him.

Whoosh!

His sword coffin opened, and the Red Lotus Sword shot into his hand. Like a furious wild beast, he charged into the depths of the mountains.

The wind roared in his ears, and the trees shot past him quickly. Killing intent surged through him, but he suddenly halted, moving a dozen zhang sideways so fast that he tore the surrounding space in the process.

He shifted several cun more, and something tore through the space beside him, slicing the hair off his sideburns.

Boom!

The peak of a hill a hundred zhang behind him exploded, cleaved open by the attack.

Li Guanqi squinted and slowly turned to look at the crown of a conifer tree a hundred zhang away. Sitting cross-legged on top of the lush crown was a youth in black robes, his hands resting on a guqin.

The moment Li Guanqi looked up at him, Cang Lu smirked. “Long time no see, Brother Li.”

Boom!

Lightning radiated from Li Guanqi, a terrifying aura erupting from him. Trees shattered. The land within a hundred zhang flattened as if it had been tilled, and the ground shook.

The Red Lotus Sword completed the Heaven-Opening transformation in one second, four chi long in his hand.

The killing intent radiating from him was almost palpable. A thin veil of blood-colored mist wrapped around him. Fire, lightning, sword intent—they mixed together and skyrocketed to the maximum. Vital force and blood surged through him. Unable to withstand the pressure, the space around him shattered and collapsed.

He was half a step into the Illusory Refinement Realm.

“Cang! Lu!”

Li Guanqi gritted his teeth. He wanted to skin him alive. If the Heavenly Intelligence Pavilion hadn’t helped out in the end, Li Nanting would have died that day.

Despite his caution, Cang Lu had still slipped through.

Cang Lu’s eyes glinted with amusement. “Your cultivation level progressed so quickly…”

Li Guanqi swung his sword. Lightning crackled and wind howled. The weather seemed to change in an instant.

The ray of sword light was only ten zhang long, but it destroyed everything in its path.

When the sword light was just a dozen zhang in front of Cang Lu, he strummed his guqin’s strings.

Twang!

Blinding golden patterns lit up on the guqin, and an ear-piercing sound wave shot out like a crescent blade.

Boom! Rumble!

The two attacks collided, the explosion’s boom traveling far and flattening the surrounding hills.

Li Guanqi looked at him gravely. He couldn’t figure out the full extent of Cang Lu’s abilities. Based on that alone, Cang Lu was at least at the Illusory Refinement Realm, and his cultivation level was higher than Li Guanqi’s.

Li Guanqi’s eyes flashed coldly. Ignoring the shockwaves of the explosion, he charged forward, relying on his physical strength.

Despite the powerful shockwaves, the hill Cang Lu stood on and the space within a hundred zhang of him remained completely unscathed.

Cang Lu chuckled. “Why are you so impatient? Aren’t you going to—”

Boom! Boom boom!

Ten consecutive rays of sword light shot out from the center of the explosion, interrupting him. A white-robed figure flew out from the flames.

Cang Lu shot to his feet and tapped the space in front of him with his foot.

“We’ll talk after you’re dead!”

Cang Lu flew more than a hundred zhang backward, parallel to the horizon. His guqin floated in front of him, and he plucked the strings so fast that his fingers left afterimages.

Twang twang! Twang twang twang!

A killer’s powerful melody rang out, sound blades bursting forth. The terrifying attack shot across the sky, carving several cuts in the space above.

Li Guanqi’s eyes flashed. Violent Yin Hellfire erupted from him.

“Burning Heart!”

Boom!

Cang Lu was still retreating when black flames erupted from his body. The moment the flames appeared, they started burning off his vital force, depleting it at an exponential rate. The flames were roasting his meridians. In just a breath’s time, his tiny meridians started to distort and stick together.

Cang Lu paled and began strumming the guqin faster.

Sound blades shot toward Li Guanqi from all directions, sealing him off. Cang Lu made a seal with his left hand, and a burst of energy surged through him. “Secret Technique, Blasphemy!”

Boom!

A mysterious energy rippled through him, and the Yin Hellfire was blasted out of his body. The dense mass of fire looked like black stars raining down from the sky.

Li Guanqi flung his wrist and roared, “Nine Heavens! Tear him to pieces!”

Roar!!

A dragon’s roar shook the skies. A thirty-zhang-long dragon charged at Cang Lu like a bolt of lightning.

“Sword Prison, activate!”

Li Guanqi snarled, his eyes filled with ice-cold killing intent. Lightning flashed under his feet, and the space around him twisted.

Rumble!

Boundless lightning energy spread across the heavens as his spatial force covered three thousand zhang of space.

Cang Lu’s eyes widened. Li Guanqi’s aura soared after activating his vital force domain.