A sword rainbow streaked across the sky, one strike tearing through the sea of clouds. With the force of a river turned upside down and the sea thrown into turmoil, it cleaved the clouds into several pieces.
Where the Sword Light pointed, there was no sharp edge, no blade—only a Rainbow Light that could sever all things, shooting straight into Azure Netherworld like a streak of light and lightning.
"Transform light into a straight line; only the true, never the strange. Cut through ten thousand..."
The deep, muffled Daoic Sound echoed once more. Bai Yi's consciousness shifted and immersed itself in the figure, experiencing firsthand the changes and might of every sword strike.
After a long while, the white mist in his Sea of Consciousness dissipated.
Inside the cave
The Heart-Questioning Sword placed beside him suddenly rose. The sharp sword slid from its sheath and circled in midair. Strands of Dao Resonance gathered from the void, surging along with the Sword Light.
A Dao Resonance rune gradually took shape on the sword, growing increasingly solid.
The instant the Dao Resonance Runes condensed, dazzling rainbow light blossomed in the darkness. Countless streams of Sword Qi continuously slashed out from within it.
The mere radiance of the rainbow light covered the surrounding rock walls with streaks of sword marks.
Chunks of rock fell from the walls, but before they could land on Bai Yi, Sword Qi tore them apart into dust.
The rainbow Sword Qi continued to draw inward. Just as it was about to solidify and cover the sword, the Sword Qi, compressed to its limit, suddenly collapsed and exploded. The wildly surging Sword Qi could not be controlled, and in an instant it destroyed and brought down the entire cave.
Boulders fell, dust billowed, and Bai Yi, holding the Azure Peak Sword, merely swung it once.
The boulders and dust before him were clearly cut in two, as if a pair of scissors had sliced through paper.
Bai Yi walked out of the collapsed cave. He let go, and the Azure Edge Sword and Heart-Questioning Sword both fell into their sheaths, hanging behind him.
"Still a little short."
With a thoughtful look in his eyes, Bai Yi sank into contemplation, trying hard to sense the flavor of that sword strike.
With the guidance and enhancement of the Enlightenment Glimmer, his White Rainbow Sword Art had already reached Dao Resonance Perfection.
By establishing his method through the Dao intent of the White Rainbow Sword Art, he had gone on to comprehend one of the Sword Dao techniques: Swordlight Transforms into a Rainbow.
Unfortunately, in the end, he had still fallen just a little short.
"Sword Qi blazing like a torch, condensing into a rainbow..."
Bai Yi murmured to himself. The Two Flying Swords on his back trembled violently as streaks of Sword Qi spread and gathered. The swords suddenly flew out of their sheaths and landed before him.
Strands of Sword Qi wound around them like silken threads, laboriously transforming into a layer of rainbow light that covered the Sword Light on the blade.
Under the compression of the vast Sword Qi, both swords trembled, and the Azure Edge Sword even gave off a faint sound.
Feeling the compressed Sword Qi about to collapse again, Bai Yi was just about to helplessly release his hold when a Beast Roar suddenly rang out from above his head.
Beneath the Beast Roar, Bai Yi's eyes suddenly brightened.
"I understand!"
"Forceful suppression must bring resistance. Use outpouring as the shell-seeming to release, yet actually restraining-and only then can light transform into a rainbow!"
Bai Yi's Divine Sense locked onto the direction from which the Beast Roar had come. The two swords took flight, their Sword Qi spilling outward yet circulating within a space of mere inches. Two dazzling, icy-cold rainbow lights streaked through the void.
At such speed, the surroundings seemed to freeze.
When the sword rainbows vanished, a black leopard leapt down.
As its hind legs landed, two fine lines spread across its body under its puzzled gaze. Then its head, torso, and limbs split into three sections and fell to the ground one after another.
"The extreme of speed, between rainbows..."
"This is one of the Sword Dao techniques: Swordlight Transforms into a Rainbow."
Gazing at the black leopard, whose body had already been cut apart but which briefly remained conscious, Bai Yi felt his thoughts roil with intermingled emotion and delight.
Aside from comprehending the Sword Dao Realm, Sword Dao techniques were the clearest demonstration of a Sword Cultivator's Sword Dao cultivation.
There were four techniques in all: Swordlight Transforms into a Rainbow, Sword Qi Like Silk, Sword Dao Thunderclap, and Swordlight Splitting.
Compared with comprehending the Sword Dao Realm, these four techniques had no clearly defined requirements for one's underlying cultivation, at least on the surface.
After a long time, many Foundation Establishment Realm Sword Cultivators might still only comprehend one despite a century of hard cultivation, while some could never enter the Sword Dao Realm in their entire lives.
The White Rainbow Sword Art he had chosen was, rather than a sword art, better described as a cultivation method specially designed by the Taiyi Sword Sect to help its juniors master the Swordlight Transforms into a Rainbow technique.
As long as one cultivated the White Rainbow Sword Art to Dao Resonance Perfection, one could touch upon the Swordlight Transforms into a Rainbow technique.
Taking it a step further then would allow one to truly master Swordlight Transforms into a Rainbow.
Just as he had gained enlightenment beneath the Dao-Deriving Mirror, cultivating the White Rainbow Sword Art to Dao Resonance Perfection, and then relied on the remaining glimmer to go a step further and touch upon Swordlight Transforms into a Rainbow.
In the end, the Beast Roar of this black leopard had awakened him, and he had finally mastered and comprehended the technique completely.
"Now that I've mastered Swordlight Transforms into a Rainbow, the might of the long sword in my hand will increase by another fifty percent!"
Bai Yi suppressed the agitation in his heart and swung his sword, cutting out a deep pit. With a palm strike, Spiritual Power turned into a gust of wind and blew the black leopard's corpse into the pit. He then covered it with earth.
The black leopard had wanted to make a meal of him, but in the end, it had given its life to point him further along his Dao Path.
Burying its corpse and returning it to the earth could be considered his repayment for advancing along his Dao Path.
He glanced back at the collapsed cave, took out the Unmanned Aerial Vehicle, and sent it up. He was preparing to head toward the other two Spirit Ore areas on Flying Stone Peak.
"Hm?!"
Just as Bai Yi set off, the indicator light on the Unmanned Aerial Vehicle to his right began flashing. Its camera lens extended to maximum zoom, and a live image appeared before him through the Terminal.
Above the lush green grass, countless Yin Souls howled as they surged out of a man.
Before the man, Guo Lin and a middle-aged man and woman lay collapsed on the ground, their bodies flat and withered like dead branches.
The man formed a hand seal, surrounded by waves of Yin Qi. He reached a claw over Guo Lin's head, then grabbed hard, directly pulling out a ghastly, illusory soul and sucking it into the green bottle in his hand.
"An evil cultivator!"
Watching the man on the screen draw out souls and seize spirits, Bai Yi furrowed his brows, and a trace of anger flared.
Whether it was killing people and seizing their souls or the evil cultivator himself, a walking treasure trove-
He couldn't let him get away!
He didn't think of himself as a saint, but on this long road to immortality, one's bottom line was the last anchor of one's conscience.
"Three kilometers away!"
The Heart-Questioning Sword left its sheath behind Bai Yi. Enveloped in Sword Light, he and his sword left the Unmanned Aerial Vehicle behind for the time being and raced toward the location in the image.
"The flesh and blood of a Late Qi Refining Vajra Crocodile Turtle."
"Just three Qi Refining, Fourth Layer Rogue Cultivators, with such shoddy Magic Arts-and they actually had something this good."
The gloomy man kicked aside the shattered Armed Mechanical Dog and opened the bundle, unable to hide his delight.
Originally, he had only planned to hunt down a few Rogue Cultivators and extract their Essence Blood and souls, adding a little more to his reserves for the plan ahead. He hadn't expected to make such a haul.
With this Spirit Food, rich in the blood and Qi of the Vajra Crocodile Turtle, his Yin Corpse could advance further. Then, after the plan succeeded, he would be able to claim a larger share of the spoils.
"Fortune truly favors me."
"With this opportunity, once the plan succeeds, I'll have a chance to enter the ranks of the Ninth Layer of Qi Refining!"
The gloomy man laughed heartily.
Once he broke through to the Ninth Layer of Qi Refining, he could become a true disciple of the Yinshan Sect, with a chance to enter the sect and glimpse the Foundation Establishment Realm.
Then, even with the Immortal Alliance protecting them, he could still draw the souls from those who had offended him and make off with them.
"They'll all die!"
Just as a savage grin spread across the gloomy man's face, an unprecedented aura of death suddenly made him feel a wave of suffocation.
He hurriedly looked up. In the sky above, a streak of Sword Light kept growing larger in his field of vision.
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