The Five Sects Part Ways, Dust Settles, Cai Shang Defeated, A Crushing Defeat

On Snow Lake, the two fought with no end in sight. The White Serpent Flexible Sword coiled, struck, stabbed, swept, and sliced... every move vicious and strange to the extreme, yet to call them merciless would be entirely wrong. Wen Caishang's swordsmanship was profound; she understood every path, and her capabilities were truly terrifying. Yet one particular weakness had been seized tightly by Li Xian, and he refused to let go.

Li Xian easily dissolved every sword move. This match fully displayed his might. Even if Wen Caishang exhausted every trick in her arsenal, injuring him in the slightest remained a fantasy. Only during this fight did he realize that the gap between the "Grand Self" realm and the "Peak Mastery" realm was as vast as the gap between heaven and earth. And the gap between Peak Mastery and "Perfection" was another thousand miles.

If Wen Caishang had used sword techniques from other sects, such as the Upper Vehicle techniques Avici Sword, Threefold Return-to-Origin Sword, and Myriad Affairs Impermanence Sword, or Middle Vehicle sword arts such as Divine Wind Looking-Back Sword and Aurora Shadow-Crossing Sword—even Lower Vehicle sword arts—she could have easily defeated Li Xian.

But the Yin-Yang Immortal Companions Sword would not do. How could she not be furious? How could she not be vexed? When had she ever suffered such a crushing loss? Her swordsmanship became increasingly disorderly, and several times she tried to receive his sword with her body to throw Li Xian's rhythm into chaos. Yet the gap between their swords was simply too great. Every scheme Wen Caishang devised proved useless.

The sword force grew ever more dense and rich. Yin and yang energies swirled above the lake like a black-and-white millstone. Every few exchanges, the black-and-white millstone slowly turned a fraction. As Li Xian