Ever since he had risen off the ground that night while refining spirit into void, an idea had begun stirring in the Four Seas Hall Master's heart:
Why not try practicing sword-riding flight? I can more or less hold my breath and float now, anyway. At least I won't fall to my death.
Once that thought arose, Xing Yan could no longer sit still. All day long, he thought of nothing but the incantation for sword-riding flight. The graceful figures of Ling Xu and Qingming, the two masters of Highest Clarity who had flown in upon their swords on Mid-Autumn night, circled endlessly through his mind.
In the end, the young man, whose willpower was hardly made of iron, failed to resist the temptation and prepared to practice sword-riding flight.
Still, he knew he had achieved only modest proficiency in the Sword-Riding Art. To be safe, he dared not begin practicing here on Thousand Birds Cliff, hundreds of fathoms high. He would have to find some low-lying ground below the mountain. In any case, according to Master Qingming, even if the Sword-Riding Flight Technique succeeded at first, it would not take him very high.
At noon the day after he made up his mind, the weather was mild and clear, the autumn sun brilliant. Forgoing his midday rest, Xing Yan took Qiong Rong and Xueyi down from Thousand Birds Cliff to a low, level patch of ground between Embracing Rosy Clouds Peak and Nameless Mountain Cliff, ready to begin trying his sect's sword-riding technique.
The little girl who accompanied him had leaped with delight the moment she heard her big brother was going to practice flying. All the way down the mountain, she had bounced around Xing Yan, clamoring that once he mastered it, he simply had to take her