[October, Year Six. You recovered from your injuries and prepared to battle the Old Devil in this Secret Realm again, only to discover that he had already left, handing the Secret Realm over to you on a silver platter. You felt slightly disgruntled, but a glimmer of understanding stirred within your sword heart. You knew the time had come for your core-breaking ascension.] [November, Year Six. You shattered your core and formed a nascent soul, becoming a power elder of the Setting Sun Sect. With two nascent soul cultivators in a single lineage, your branch enjoyed tremendous prestige. Meanwhile, your master, Liu Chenyu, was still at the core formation middle stage.] [May, Year Eight. After a year and a half in seclusion, you fully stabilized your cultivation in the nascent soul realm. At this point, you suddenly remembered the calamity awaiting the Setting Sun Sect. Without hesitation, you mounted your flying sword and sped out of the Setting Sun Sect.] [September, Year Eight. After three months of searching, you finally found the place where the Old Devil slumbered. You originally intended to withdraw for now and return to the mountain to inform the sect's Spirit Transformation Ancestor of the situation. Unexpectedly, the Yin Corpse Sect's Spirit Transformation Ancestor guarding this place discovered you. Had you fled at that moment, you might still have had a thread of hope. Yet without hesitation, you unleashed your **Most Brilliant Sword Strike**. This strike embodied every ounce of your will. Its light shone for a hundred miles, and it actually cleaved open the Old Devil's skull. Although the Old Devil forcibly awakened at the last moment, saving his brains from being pulverized by your strike, he still suffered grievous injuries. With your lamp nearly dry of oil, you met death with a smile.] [You died!]
You already spelled it out that clearly. Did you really need to drive the point home at the end?
Xu Changxing grumbled inwardly, but his emotions still refused to settle.
Although all that had appeared in his mind were lines of text, he could faintly envision that lifetime of his, sword light sweeping across the world.
His only regret was that he had still died in the end.
Looking back now, he realized that his willingness to face death so calmly had probably been inseparable from those years of bloody combat in the Secret Realm.
Without those years of deadly trials, he probably would never have gone from someone who always played it safe to a lone hero at the very end.
Li Changge's Secret Realm is poison.
When he comes to invite me, I absolutely must refuse!
Xu Changxing had just reached this conclusion when the system's voice rang out again.
[Simulation complete.] [Evaluation: Once again, you died, to no one's surprise. Yet through your efforts alone, you severely wounded an Old Devil who would otherwise have unleashed a storm of blood and carnage in the years to come. Righteous cultivators all held you up as an example. Even a thousand years after your death, people still sang of your deeds.] [Based on the simulation results, you may select one of the following rewards.] [1. View footage of your simulated life from a first-person perspective.] [2. Core formation late stage cultivation.] [3. Five Elements Sword Art.] [4. The Divine Sword Phantom celebrated in countless people's songs.]
Xu Changxing's eyes brightened slightly at the second reward.
He had originally only wanted to spend a thousand low-grade spirit stones to quickly reach the foundation establishment late stage.
He had never expected the system to take him straight to the core formation late stage this time.
But his excitement lasted only an instant before his brow furrowed.
A question had suddenly occurred to him.
In the previous simulation, he seemed to have formed only a second-rank core.
Although his golden core had later shattered and condensed into a sword core, what if the system went haywire and gave him only a second-rank golden core?
Besides, even if the system gave him a sword core, it might not suit his current self.
He had heard that sword cultivators valued the sword heart above all else.
If his resolve in the Dao was unstable, he might not be able to hold on to a sword core even if he received one.
He had managed to condense a sword core in the simulation because his repeated brushes with death in the Secret Realm had honed his peerless sword intent.
If a sword core were simply stuffed into Xu Changxing's body and its sword qi surged into his sea of consciousness, his current self might not be able to suppress it.
This thing certainly did not come with a seven-day, no-questions-asked return policy.
If the golden core he received did not suit him, he would cry himself to death.
Had he possessed no other options, that would have been one thing. Never mind a sword core-even a second-rank golden core would have been an excellent choice.
The problem was that Xu Changxing had plenty of options.
He could simply use repeated simulations to try condensing a golden core better suited to him.
Xu Changxing hesitated for a long time before finally tearing his gaze away with a pang.
Of the remaining three options, he eliminated the third first.
Although the Five Elements Sword Art was powerful, it held little value for him.
Even if the Five Elements Sword Art were placed before him now, it would not immediately turn him into a powerful sword cultivator.
By comparison, watching himself cultivate and fight in the simulation would be more valuable.
With the experience of his previous cultivation, he would surely achieve twice the results with half the effort.
As for the final option, it sat there without context or even an explanation.
Xu Changxing had no idea whether it could support his cultivation, help him cultivate his sword heart, or was simply a "medal" for him to keep as a memento.
In short, he could make neither head nor tail of it.
It gave Xu Changxing the impression of someone saying, "There, I've tossed you the reward. Take it or leave it."
Should I spend a thousand low-grade spirit stones on the experience of cultivating from weakness to strength, or on opening a mystery box?
Xu Changxing agonized over it for quite a while before finally gritting his teeth. "I choose four!"
He wanted to see just what reward this mystery box held.
As his words fell, specks of starlight suddenly appeared in his sea of consciousness.
They swiftly gathered together, finally condensing into a small, illusory sword.
When Xu Changxing tried touching the illusory sword with his spiritual sense, several lines of text popped up in his mind.
[Divine Sword Phantom: The sword strike you unleashed in desperate circumstances strangled a calamity for righteous cultivators in its cradle. Your deeds passed down through the ages, celebrated in the songs of countless cultivators. The phantoms within their thoughts gathered in your sea of consciousness, condensing into this illusory divine sword. When activated, it can reproduce that strike of yours at fifty percent of its original power. After a single strike, this Divine Sword Phantom will dissipate completely.]
After reading these lines, Xu Changxing's eyes shone with excitement.
"What a windfall!"
A strike unleashed by a nascent soul sword cultivator who burned away everything was terrifying, even at only half its power.
An ordinary core formation cultivator would be all but certain to die, and even a Nascent Soul Ancestor would probably struggle to escape unscathed.
He just did not know what price he would have to pay to activate this trump card.
Although the system had not specified one, such a terrifying trump card could not possibly come without a cost.
Still, whatever the case, he now had a life-saving trump card.
If he had possessed something like this before the simulation, perhaps those friends of his in the simulation would not have had to die.
Then he might not have become that lone hero later on.
Even so, he had no intention of accepting Li Changge's invitation.
Wasn't it better to simply stay alive? Why go risking his neck fighting anyone?
Before you continue