Soul Herder, Portable Inn! (First update; please vote!)

"Sword-Driving Style: Third Form, Swallow Looks Back!"

A shout exploded through the dim burial chamber, carrying an odd accent.

The Eastern Seas warrior before Li Xiang gripped his sword with both hands. His body twisted strangely as his blade swept upward, wheeling back like a swallow skimming the water and heading straight for Li Xiang's throat.

Warriors from the Eastern Seas had a habit of shouting their technique names before attacking, as if their swords could not kill without it.

That shout told Li Xiang exactly who he was dealing with.

A swordsman of the Sasaki Family.

Ever since the Yagyu Family opened a Daoist Arena in Linjiang County, Li Xiang had gathered information on Eastern Seas martial arts to know both himself and his enemy.

Among them, the Sasaki Family, a renowned school of Eastern Seas Swordsmanship, was famous for its unpredictable Sword-Driving Technique.

It was said to have originated as a killing sword for the battlefield. Its rules were strict and strange: a master demonstrated each move only once. A successor had to absorb every form left by his predecessors, then create a new form of his own before passing it to the next generation.

That almost cruel process of elimination had produced countless branches of the Sword-Driving Technique. Those that survived and passed on their teachings were all ruthless fighters who had crawled out of heaps of corpses.

That the Sword-Driving Technique had never died out was astonishing.

But astonishment did nothing to slow Li Xiang's blade. At the same time, he listened to the sound of his opponent's sword.

As the edge was about to reach him, Li Xiang's senses sharpened. The movement of the air, the frequency of the blade's vibrations, and the faint sounds of muscles exerting force came together in his mind as