"The Huaixu Calamity."
An Jing himself had glimpsed fragments of these stories in ancient texts. They belonged to the ancient past, at least tens of thousands of years ago, and many records were vague and incomplete.
In the end, the ancient Immortal Citizens drove out the Heavenly Demons and established many states anew. The founder of Da Chen was one of them, and through the long Warring States era, Da Chen eventually became the greatest nation in Beixuan Jizhou.
The murals were nearing their end. The farther in they went, the richer and more complete their contents became. Some had clearly been painted over in later eras.
An Jing's expression grew ever more solemn.
Because he saw the Heavenly Demon's revival.
As the long years flowed by, even the statues of the Sword Immortals of old had crumbled. Then, fiendish energy erupted from Xuanming Valley, faintly taking the shape of a Heavenly Demon.
It guided the waters of a hundred rivers to scour Xuanming Valley, which had not originally been a river valley, wearing away the seal in an attempt to break free. The ancient people, in turn, used this to their advantage, constructing a Ley Line Array founded upon the mountains and rivers, and sealing the Heavenly Demon once more.
That was the origin of Xuanming Valley as it stood today.
"The Heavenly Demon actually revived once before?"
An Jing murmured, "Fuxie, weren't you awake back then?"
"I don't know..." The Sword Spirit's voice was solemn too. "My memories... are missing too much."
"When did I shatter? It seems it was some time after I slew that Heavenly Demon. I even remember that my fragments were enshrined here, and that someone intended to use the power of the people's sacrifices and the stimulus of the Heavenly Demon to awaken me and bring me back to life. That was the prototype of the Array Formation that awakened your Fate Grids..."
"Yes. Xuanming Valley originally had no river, and there were many sacrificial caves along both sides of the valley walls... But after the Heavenly Demon revived, I truly don't know much about the details of the second sealing."
An Jing nodded slightly. He had also sensed that something was amiss. The Sword Spirit's hilt had been unearthed in the Northern Frontier—his own homeland—and had only come to Xuanming Valley in the northwest by chance, where the Demonic Cult stored it in their vault.
The power hidden in the hilt had gone undiscovered. The Sword Spirit's main consciousness resided in the hilt, while the fragments had no consciousness to speak of.
Xuanming Valley had been overrun by fiendish energy, and even the Demonic Cult dared not enter. Yet the Sword Spirit could suppress that energy as soon as it arrived, proof that it countered fiendish energy.
But the "fragments" in the valley had never reacted strongly to the fiendish energy. The energy could only be suppressed through a Ritual Sacrifice.
Though the Ley Line Sword Qi summoned by the Ritual Sacrifice Array proved it existed, its condition was probably dire.
Speaking of which, the Sword Spirit's fragments had been scattered far and wide back then. Some had even ended up in other worlds...
An Jing instinctively sensed that the truth behind it all was complicated.
Of course it was. The shattering of a Sword Immortal's Immortal Sword had to have an incredibly complicated story behind it.
This was the karmic debt he had to bear for using the Sword Spirit's power. So, after exhaling, he continued onward.
Soon, the long passage came to an end.
A huge semicircular hall, clearly not formed by nature, appeared deep in the valley.
Before the entrance was a staircase shaped like a "√," which had kept the hall quite clean and tidy, with no sign of flooding. He could just make out the remains of a rotted cushion in the center.
An Jing emerged from the passage and entered the man-made semicircular hall.
And there he saw the "divine object," set upon a towering jade altar at the far end of the hall.
[Fragment of a Sword Blade]
A thick, diamond-shaped blade fragment glimmering with silver-blue light.
An Jing froze. A powerful sense of familiarity welled up within him, as if he had seen this fragment hundreds of millions of times—but he soon realized that the feeling had been transmitted to him by the Sword Spirit. The Rusty Sword trembled faintly in his Divine Sea. "This is my Sword Root... But strange. Where's the protective Array Formation?"
An Jing looked around. The walls and domed ceiling of the semicircular hall were covered in densely packed patterns of mountains, seas, clouds, dragons, and phoenixes. On the pale blue jade, they faintly formed a vast Array Formation.
But it wasn't running.
Or rather, it had been destroyed.
Gray-black streaks spread across the pale blue jade. The jade beneath them was rough and withered, utterly devoid of warmth and spiritual vitality.
It was like the body of a dead person. The jade had lost all its vitality and moisture, and over thousands of years, it had gradually "rotted" into its current state.
"Corrupted by the Heavenly Demon," An Jing murmured. "Only the very center is still intact."
"Thank goodness we made it in time." The Sword Spirit was anxious, but quickly regained composure. "Go on, An Jing. Sword-bearer, take my fragment. You're worthy."
"Okay."
An Jing nodded slightly and walked up to the altar,
A layer of pale jade light glimmered across each step. As the Sword Spirit had said, nothing blocked An Jing's way, and he reached the top of the altar without trouble.
At that moment, even his usually steady heart began to race.
An Jing took a deep breath, reining in his impulse as he slowly reached out to touch the blade fragment.
The instant he did, silver light flared.
The blue-green hue that had covered the broken jade sword and the altar suddenly blazed, lighting up the entire hemispherical cavern hall. The pale blue jade on the inner walls glimmered in unison, their interwoven lights forming an immortal realm wreathed in mist.
Standing at its center, An Jing's expression shifted. As he touched the fragment, the light on the blade and altar began to gather at astonishing speed. The once-sharp, sturdy silver and the warm, spiritual blue rapidly faded, turning the same lifeless gray-black as the jade corrupted by the Heavenly Demon on the walls, like the rotting corpse of a dead man.
All the vitality and spiritual essence gathered in An Jing's hand, becoming a hazy fragment of light!
Then the broken sword fragment swept through the air in a graceful arc toward An Jing's forehead—and, aided by the Sword Spirit, sank into his head!
An Jing didn't flinch. He stood straight and raised a hand to touch his forehead. Finding no wound, and realizing that the dampness was only cold sweat, he finally let out a breath.
"You scared me half to death, Fuxie. Don't pull something that shocking again—or at least give me a heads-up."
Honestly, An Jing hated how well he had trained himself. If he hadn't trained so well, he could have fallen flat on his backside and taken the chance to lie there, breathing heavily.
But his stance was as solid as iron. Even as cold sweat poured off him and soaked his clothes, he stood ramrod straight, forced to expend effort and willpower to calm himself little by little.
In his Divine Sea, a segment of blade had appeared above the hilt and guard of the Broken Blade. The blade was illusory, shining with light and releasing wisps of pale silver energy. It seemed to have greatly deepened An Jing's understanding of the Qingjing Sword Temple.
He wasn't worried that the Sword Spirit had just tried to possess him. The Sword Spirit itself sounded utterly bewildered. "How could this be... My blade has rotted away, leaving only its Spirit Soul?!"
"I had already attained immortality and imperishability. Even a fragment of mine should be eternal and indestructible. How could it have rotted like this?"
An Jing didn't know what realm the Sword Spirit had reached back then, but it had never acted superior. It had always spoken calmly and courteously, and this was the first time he had seen it so shaken.
Even so, An Jing couldn't help wanting to gripe: Immortal and imperishable? Wasn't your original body just a broken Rusty Sword? Why were you so shocked that the blade had rotted?
But that wasn't the end of it. The next instant, An Jing felt the broken sword in his Divine Sea tremble violently, and heard a voice filled with such disbelief it was almost bewildered.
"How... how could this be?!"
"My blade doesn't even have my memories?!"
Before you continue