Stars Fall in the Divine Realm

The Ninth Divine Region behind the fog wall was unrecognizable. The nine islands that had been suspended were now plummeting like arrows with broken strings. The golden stars representing the Sword Master shattered into thirteen streams of light. Twelve of them merged into the Divine Lord's palace, and the last one shot directly towards Chu Mo's brow. His twin pupils suddenly constricted as he saw each stream of light carrying different memories: the red-haired Divine Lord burning her Life Bead on the altar, the white-robed Divine Lord stabbing a sword into his heart to extend the lives of mortals, and that figure always wearing a bronze mask, standing atop Hong Meng Hall and devouring starlight.

"Chu Mo, your swords!" Yun Che's cry startled him awake. The Chaos Sword and Fate Defying Sword had somehow left their sheaths and automatically pieced together into a Star Map in the air. The cluster of light points on the Sword Tassel transformed into thirteen Light Butterflies, flying towards the falling islands. When the first Light Butterfly touched the collapsing Mount Guiji, the bones of the entire mountain peak suddenly rang like bells. The Sword Tombs that had been polluted by the Demon God actually began to sprout new shoots. What condensed on the tender shoots was the power of the Dawn of Primordial Chaos brought by the cluster of light points.

"The starfall isn't destruction, it's rebirth." Chu Mo caught the fragment of starlight on his chest and found that it was engraved with the same patterns as the rings of the old locust tree. "The Sword Master's thirteen stars were actually thirteen life-unraveling talismans left for the Chaos Sword Body." He looked towards Hong Meng Hall where the bronze-masked person was. In the black mist there, the phantoms of the twelve Divine Lords were being absorbed by the Sword Tassel in the masked person's hand.

Yun Che suddenly pointed at the sea, "Look! A giant sword-shaped tree has grown on the ruins of Godfall Island!" The giant tree, condensed from Chaos Power, was absorbing the falling starlight. Each leaf reflected Chu Mo and Yun Che from different times and spaces — there were those who shattered mirrors in the Mirror Abyss Corridor, those who embraced the Light Cocoon on Mount Guiji, and those who taught children swordplay in the land of the Dawn of Primordial Chaos. "So, every choice we make is reshaping the laws of the Divine Realm."

The masked person suddenly turned around, a cold smile playing on the corner of his mouth beneath the mask. He raised his hand, and the gates of Hong Meng Hall opened with a bang. Suspended inside the hall were the corpses of the twelve Divine Lords. The Life Beads at their chests had been gouged out, replaced by the same Chaos Sword Body mark as Chu Mo's. "Welcome back, the 108th Host of the Chaos Sword Body." His voice was like the scraping of rusty chains. "Or perhaps, I should call you... the new Sword Master?"

Chu Mo's Twin Life Force suddenly surged. He saw that the wrist exposed from the masked person's sleeve was engraved with the same Dao Patterns as the silver-scaled man. "You're the youngest of the twelve disciples..." Chu Mo's voice was edged with ice. "Thirty thousand years, and you're still obsessed with being the Sword Master's shadow?"

The masked person took off his mask, revealing a hideous sword scar on his left cheek — an mark from the battle of Mount Guiji, scratched by the finger bone of the Sword Master's skeleton. "Shadow?" He laughed loudly, his laughter mixed with the wails of the twelve Divine Lords. "The twelve of us willingly became demonized, just to prove: without the Sword Master's lineage, the Divine Realm can still function!" He raised his hand, and the twelve Divine Lord corpses simultaneously opened their eyes, dark purple flames identical to the Demon God's Heart flickering within.

"Their spiritual veins are long withered, you're forcibly resurrecting them with the Demon God's remnants!" Yun Che's soft sword drew out an ice cage, but she found that the moment the ice cage touched the corpses, it was instead dyed a chaotic grey. The Light Butterflies from the cluster of light points suddenly flew back, surrounding her. The light points that had been saved actually voluntarily merged into the ice cage, transforming it into an "Original Heart Cage" capable of purifying delusions.

At this moment, Chu Mo's twin swords completed the Star Map splicing. The sword bodies showed the main principles never recorded by the First Generation Sword Master — "Thirteen Stars Fall, Ten Thousand Daos Return to Silence; Weigh with the Heart, Measure Destiny." When he swung his sword towards the masked person, the blade actually passed through the other's body, but on the wall of Hong Meng Hall behind him, it cut open a rift leading to the land of the Dawn of Primordial Chaos.

"You think killing me will end it?" The masked person retreated into the rift, raising his hand to recall the Sword Tassel that was absorbing starlight. "Look at your sword, the core of the Chaos Sword Body... the Seed of Finality was planted by the Sword Master long ago."

Chu Mo lowered his head and saw that the scabbard of the Chaos Sword had somehow developed cracks identical to the Sword Master's coffin. Leaking from the cracks was not golden Divine Blood, but black Chaos delusion. Yun Che suddenly grabbed his hand and pressed her Ice Clan Fate Pearl onto the cracks. The streams of light from the cluster of light points also surged in, actually forcing the delusion back into the depths of the scabbard.

"The Seed of Finality he mentioned should refer to the... obsession with self-sacrifice that the Sword Master left in every Host." Yun Che recalled a certain ending she saw in the Light Cocoon, where Chu Mo willingly transformed into a new Sword Master skeleton to seal the Demon God. "But our Dao Hearts are no longer something the Sword Master can control."

Light rain suddenly fell from the sky of the Ninth Divine Region. The mortals affected by the starfall were condensing physical bodies with the help of the cluster of light points. Chu Mo saw a young girl with a Zi Lin hair tie running hand-in-hand with her mother. Her eyes were exactly the same as the little girl Yun Che saved in the land of the Dawn of Primordial Chaos — a new life reshaped by Chaos Power, without the memory of being sacrificed.

"Chu Mo, look!" Yun Che pointed at the gradually clearing Star Map. Their Sword Master star was reorganizing, and outside the Star Map, a thirteenth, brand new star appeared. It was engraved with the same blank runes as the old locust tree's stone tablet. "This is our Dao. There is no predetermined path, only the possibility of cutting as we please."

The masked person's figure gradually blurred in the rift. What he threw out last were the Life Beads of the twelve Divine Lords. Each Life Bead reflected Chu Mo's reflection in the land of the Dawn of Primordial Chaos. "Remember, when the Chaos Sword Body begins to absorb delusion, that is the true end of the Divine Realm..." Before his voice disappeared, the rustling sound of the old locust tree came from the rift, as if echoing the answer in Chu Mo's heart.

The Chaos Sword suddenly emitted a clear sword cry. The cracks on the scabbard completely healed, replaced by new runes woven by the cluster of light points and the Twin True Intent — a pattern that had never appeared in any Sword Art, resembling a sword, a heart, and even more so, the overlapping palm lines of Chu Mo and Yun Che.

When the two stepped onto the steps of Hong Meng Hall, the twelve Divine Lord corpses inside the hall suddenly knelt down collectively. The Chaos Sword Body marks on their chests turned into light points and merged into Chu Mo's Endless Body. In the depths of his Sea of Consciousness, the remnant soul of the Sword Master and the remnant soul of the Demon God coexisted peacefully for the first time, as if waiting for this young man who broke all the rules to put an end to their thirty thousand years of grievances.

Yun Che suddenly pointed at the starry sky above the hall. A galaxy made of Light Butterflies had appeared there at some point. Each Light Butterfly carried a saved member of the cluster of light points. "Chu Mo, do you think we can create a truly free Divine Realm for those lives that haven't been polluted in this star river?"

Chu Mo looked at the starlight reflected in her eyes and remembered the rift they had cut with wooden swords under the old locust tree in the land of the Dawn of Primordial Chaos — there was the scent of green grass, the light laughter while practicing swords, and the most authentic life that belonged to no lineage. He suddenly understood that the responsibility of the so-called Fate Defying Sword Sovereign was never to protect a predetermined world, but to give every life the right to choose its own Dao Heart.

"We can." Chu Mo held her hand, and their twin swords simultaneously pointed at the starry sky. "With our swords, we will carve out a path... without end or beginning, for all those who refuse to be bound by fate."

The bell of Hong Meng Hall rang again. This time, there was no longer the vicissitudes of thirty thousand years in the bell sound, only the clear, hopeful sound belonging to the new Sword Sovereign. And in the lingering resonance of the bell, on the ruins of the Ninth Divine Region, a new forest was growing, jointly nurtured by Chaos and Primordial Chaos. Engraved in the rings of every tree was the same name — Chu Mo and Yun Che, and the legend of the Endless Sword Dao they were about to create.