Volume 3, Chapter 75 – Exchange (Two-in-One)

Compared to Yuming Peak and the main Shenming Peak, construction on Clear-Mist Peak was progressing much more slowly. That was because, for the moment, this peak didn’t really have any disciples.

The main Shenming Peak had to host the Dao Grand Ceremony, it had to receive guests, so there needed to be places for them to stay.

Yuming Peak was the same. The batch of disciples Xiang Xian and Guo Rongzhi had brought over was small in number, but they still needed lodgings. So the work crews had all been rushed toward those two sides, and Clear-Mist Peak, as Bai Xiang had said, only had a single “pavilion and side courtyard” built on it.

The building basically only served as a scenic spot. Bai Xiang led Qin Wuyang down into the pavilion and found seats. She rested her hand on her sword hilt and blurred her figure for a moment. A protruding knuckle of rock outside the pavilion scraped with a crackling sound as a chunk was sliced off.

The blurring continued. In midair, the stone seemed to be cut by invisible blades. First it split in two, then each half was quickly carved into the shape of a cup. In the end, they became two stone cups, caught a measure of dew, and spun back.

Bai Xiang took one cup for herself. Qin Wuyang took the other.

He lowered his head and sniffed the dew, catching a faint, delicate fragrance. He understood at once. That dew had probably been collected from fresh green tea leaves.

Tea like this would feel rather bland to an ordinary person, but Qin Wuyang drank it with real enjoyment and offered his verdict. “Dao Lord Bai has good taste. It seems that if I have time in the future, I can come sit here more often.”

“The stronger brew actually tastes better, but I don’t think Dao-friend Qin would enjoy that kind of bitter flavor.” Bai Xiang also sipped the dew, then sat down facing Qin Wuyang and went straight to the point. “Dao-friend Qin, would you count as being in the Sword Lord realm?”

“Yes and no.” Qin Wuyang shook his head.

“Yes, because if you compare me to other people, the gap is large. They would indeed count me as such.”

“No, because compared to my true body, the gap is just as large. Neither my true body nor I are willing to call it that.”

“Dao-friend Qin asked me about the ‘great elixir within the human body’ earlier.” Bai Xiang asked again, “So this ‘Innate epiphany’ is the process of harvesting that elixir?”

“Basically.” Qin Wuyang sighed. “In essence, it’s similar to the state of Returning to the Innate. The difference is, back then if you stayed in Returning to the Innate too long you would die from dried-out blood and essence. But during an Innate epiphany, by harvesting the great elixir you instead feed that essence back, while also triggering the body’s potential and pushing the flesh to a further level of reinforcement.”

Once the physical strength rose to that level, the spirit would grow stronger in turn. It was like reinforcing both the candle and the flame, turning it into a torch. The demonic power pollution that had once threatened the candle naturally stopped being a problem and would instead be ruthlessly suppressed.

So of course Sword Lords were different from the realms below. They were able to suppress the pollution. Their flesh and spirit no longer suffered under its torment. Their bodily functions could roll back to their peak and stay fixed there until the day Heaven’s appointed limit arrived.

However, the process was different for every person. People’s mind-flows differed, and just knowing that fact was not enough to enter that state.

Take Bai Xiang, for example. She had Bai Zhuqing as a reference case. When she compared the “Hidden Field aperture” position her younger sister had described against her own, she found that the exact position of the two didn’t match.

From the outside, pressing on the body, the difference might be just a few millimeters. In the inner body-scape, in the flow of the mind, it was a gulf of a thousand miles. It was no wonder that even after she had told Xiang Xian about the Hidden Field aperture, the latter still couldn’t find it.

This was why Sword Lords were still so rare.

An Innate epiphany did not necessarily make you a Sword Lord. If you couldn’t even enter that state, the Sword Lord realm was all the more out of reach.

Bai Xiang and Qin Wuyang exchanged a great deal of information about Innate epiphanies, and her understanding of the Innate grew still deeper.

“Many records say that once you break through the Innate you will inevitably become a Sword Lord. That’s not correct.” Qin Wuyang shook his head. “To become a Sword Lord, the core is to suppress and control the demonic power inside the body, to let the human power take the lead and break the shackles created when demonic power locks everything down.”

“But everyone refines different Demon Pools. Everyone’s constitution is different, and the total amount of demonic power they cultivate is not the same.”

“The Innate epiphany only gives us an opportunity, a chance to break those shackles by harvesting elixir to our heart’s content while in that state.”

“If the demonic power you need to suppress is relatively thin, that’s easier to accomplish.”

“If the demonic power you need to suppress is vast and mighty, then you need to harvest more elixir, to find and awaken more meridians and apertures.”

“So it’s only natural that in history there have been cases where the deeper the foundation you lay, the more great elixirs you have to collect to break the realm.”

“Yet Innate epiphanies, like Returning to the Innate, are unstable. If you fail to do it before the duration runs out, that basically means the attempt failed. Not only will becoming a Sword Lord in this life be unlikely, you might even suffer demonic backlash and become Yaosui.”

Bai Xiang digested this information, then asked, “In that case, is there any way to start harvesting elixir during the Returning to the Innate of entering the Dao?”

Clearly, Qin Wuyang understood that demonic power was filthy stuff.

The Suzhen Sword Lord very likely knew it too.

So why not cut out that entire middle process and cultivate the Human Dao from the very beginning? That was what she found curious.

“It’s hard.” Qin Wuyang curled his lip. “Anyone can explain the principle. Talking about it is the easy part. It’s not that we haven’t tried. Aside from Qingping half-succeeding, every other path failed.”

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“Qingping and Suzhen share the same root.” He suddenly dropped a huge secret.

“The first generation Qingping Dao Lord was that generation’s Suzhen Dao Lord. His name was Qin Zhen. At eighty-eight, as his allotted span approached, he fell into madness seeking a method to extend his life and eventually worked out the Taishang Slaying-Emotions Life-Preserving Scripture, using the path of ruthlessness to suppress pollution.”

The Taishang Slaying-Emotions Life-Preserving Scripture. This wondrous art was also considered a heterodox, evil skill in the eyes of the Nine Daos, yet Qin Wuyang showed no scruples at all and directly began discussing its key points with Bai Xiang.

According to his description, this method split one’s own soul. A sliver of soul-light became the lord, wrapped on the outside with all the demonic power one had cultivated throughout life, even the Divine Fetus and the life-bound sword were stuffed into it, all to refine an external avatar.

That resolved one of Bai Xiang’s doubts. Before, she hadn’t understood how this differed from Daokong’s Yaosui. The difference was that there was an extra sliver of soul-light, and what’s more, the Divine Fetus and the life-bound sword were also refined into the avatar.

Did that not mean “Qin Wuyang” was essentially the collection of Chu Weiping’s sword power?

Slaying emotions in the Taishang way.

What it severed was not as simple as personal feelings. It also cut away the attachment to the Sword Dao path itself.

You had to understand that this was the fruit of a cultivator’s lifetime of study and pursuit.

To abandon something like that at a word.

This kind of decisiveness inspired admiration.

“At first, this technique arose purely for the sake of clinging to life.” Qin Wuyang smiled. “Senior Qin stumbled into it by accident. He discovered that after discarding his lifetime of cultivation and tossing all mundane entanglements onto the avatar, he himself instead fell into a subtle state.”

“I don’t know if you can picture it. It was a state close to an Innate epiphany. He found that although the true body had lost its lifetime of sword power, it was more in tune with the natural Heavenly Dao.”

“It was a constant epiphany, happening every moment.”

“It was then that he made his decision to secede from Suzhen, to found Qingping, to pull the Dao-lineage away from Suzhen’s control.”

Bai Xiang could understand.

Put simply, in the logic of the Taishang Slaying-Emotions Life-Preserving Scripture, you could regard the avatar as a sword.

You handed all the “demon” portion to the avatar, and the avatar continued to cultivate demon arts. The true body received the chance to switch to the Human Dao. By relying on ruthlessness, it strove to harmonize with the natural Heavenly Dao and further develop the great elixir of the human body, that is, deepen body refinement in an attempt to break past the great limit.

In this way, the hidden danger of the Sword Dao was neatly resolved.

Because the true body had already severed emotion, no pollution could affect it.

The only variable lay in that sliver of true spirit.

That was the condensation of all the feelings a cultivator had experienced in one life. It had been ripped out in an extreme way, like tearing off a remnant soul to turn into Yaosui. Its state was likely highly unstable.

“Innate epiphanies are something you can only stumble into.” Qin Wuyang drank his dew and clicked his tongue. “Even as a Sword Lord, you can’t force one to happen. So now you know why Suzhen cannot control us.”

Of course they could not.

Bai Xiang pressed her lips together.

They had at least one more chance at an Innate epiphany. The true body was even enjoying a weakened version of that epiphany every moment. In terms of how far they developed the body, their degree would probably far outstrip the Sword Lords of other Daos.

“Senior Qin realized that the method he had stumbled on might be an opportunity, a chance to seek a new path.”

As he spoke, the silver-haired elder looked out at the sea of clouds.

“So he had to stand apart.”

“Before he succeeded, he didn’t wish to share that burden with his peers.”

“But new paths are hard.”

“He only used the Taishang Slaying-Emotions Scripture after becoming a Sword Lord. The Qingping disciples who came after him could not imitate him and could only do as you said earlier, becoming test subjects from the moment they entered the Dao.”

Bai Xiang narrowed her eyes. “Because their ‘hearts were not clear’?”

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Qin Wuyang gave her a surprised look, then tilted his chin in a nod. “Exactly.”

Here, the explanation brushed against something fairly metaphysical. Put simply, it could be described as life experience.

When you’re a child, learning something feels very difficult. When you grow up and come back to learn it, you find it simple.

It isn’t that your raw intellect has improved. It’s the added effect of life experience.

The Sword Dao was the same, and in some ways depended even more on the tempering of experience. Only once you had passed through the grinding of the mortal world and condensed a heart strong enough would that sliver of true spirit, once split off, be stable enough to control the power you had separated out.

If you played that trick right when you entered the Dao, you might advance quickly. Bai Xiang even felt that it was entirely possible for Qingping disciples to inherit quite a bit of demonic power from their master. That might let them use the Taishang Slaying-Emotions Scripture the moment they entered the Dao, then “harvest great elixir,” and perhaps from the outset stand shoulder to shoulder with Purple Core or even Divine Fetus.

But there was a price.

Using a youth’s life experience to shoulder a burden that heavy. The best outcome would be mental instability and split personality. The worst would be ending up like Daokong, turning into Yaosui.

It was very dangerous.

If that worst-case scenario occurred, the harm would be far greater than what Daokong had posed.

Bai Xiang had previously browsed Yuming’s library and seen several cases in the historical records where various Daos, led by Suzhen, besieged Qingping together.

Back then she had assumed that this was just Suzhen’s usual way of doing things, that they always suppressed whoever rose up, just like today when they were suppressing Shenming Sword Dao.

But putting it in context now, any normal person faced with a “sinister art” like the Taishang Slaying-Emotions Scripture would feel uneasy and wouldn’t sleep soundly until they’d cut out that hidden danger.

“We almost messed it up at the beginning. Afterward, we understood that you cannot skip the Sword Dao process.” Qin Wuyang looked into Bai Xiang’s eyes. “At the very least, you have to let people understand what it feels like to be polluted by demonic power, to let them understand that torment and that pain, so that they have a reference when they cut away emotion.”

So in Qingping, the Sword Dao was actually a burden.

It truly was unlike the Dao-lines of any other school.

“I’m very glad, Dao Lord Bai.” Qin Wuyang suddenly smiled.

“I once fell into despair over this human world and thought that there was no road ahead.”

“Until I heard your stories, and came in person to witness them.”

Bai Xiang also looked at Qin Wuyang, and she felt genuine respect for this man.

Qin Wuyang, or perhaps one should say Chu Weiping.

He was not like other cultivators.

He and Bai Xiang were the same type of person. Both hungered to break into new realms, to seek challenges and shatter their limits, to savor the fear of life and death and bear it while also enjoying it. They did not care whether someone else had gotten ahead of them.

When Bai Xiang had been thinking things through before, she had also hoped that someone in this world could see through the secret of immortality.

If that really happened, she would not feel jealous. She would only be happy.

Because her pursuits would multiply.

She would have more targets to challenge.

Suddenly, she extended her right hand and pointed at the center of Qin Wuyang’s brow.

His body stiffened at first, but he immediately suppressed his instinctive reaction and let Bai Xiang’s sword finger touch his brow. His pupils trembled violently in an instant.

“…You’re not afraid that, when we cross swords in the Nine Prefectures, I’ll stand in your way?”

After a long silence, Qin Wuyang narrowed his eyes at Bai Xiang.

His fists were clenched tight on his knees. If you looked closely, they were trembling slightly, as if he were very nervous about how she would answer.

“Come if you like.” Bai Xiang met his gaze, completely unafraid.

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“I’m not afraid.”

“Good.” Qin Wuyang nodded.

“Good, good.”

“My Dao is not alone. My Dao is not alone anymore.”

“Ha ha ha ha!”

Laughing loudly, his figure suddenly shot away into the distance, leaving only his voice echoing between the mountains.

“I’ll remember this favor!”

“Good dao-friend, next time we meet, let’s compare again!”

Just at that moment, Senior Sister Qin and Xiang Xian had finally climbed up to the peak. Seeing this scene, her eyes went wide.

The pressure on that mountaintop had been so deep and heavy that they hadn’t dared to fly, forced instead to climb step by step, painfully slow.

And now that I finally made it up here, you crusty old man actually ran off?

What about me?

What about your big, grown disciple here?

Hey, you…

“Wait for me!” Senior Sister Qin shouted in a hurry. Her body paused, then she suddenly turned to look at Bai Xiang in the pavilion.

“Dao Lord Bai.” She cupped her hands toward Bai Xiang, then pulled a small white jade vial and a jade token from her chest and tossed them over.

“Time is tight. This is a meeting gift. Congratulations to Shenming on entering the Nine Daos.”

Then she also lifted off from the ground, turning into an afterimage that slipped into the sea of clouds. In moments, she was gone from sight.

Bai Xiang caught the two items, frowned slightly, and quickly set them on the table.

Xiang Xian hurried in. “How did the talk go?”

“We gained a lot.” Bai Xiang nodded.

“Have Senior Brother Guo arrange it for me.” She looked toward the south. “I’m leaving tonight.”

With these gains and insights, she was even more hopeful about the possibilities of the Through-Meridians Method.

…

After the battle with Qin Wuyang, Bai Xiang’s name shook the Nine Provinces.

There had been too many onlookers, too many sects present. There was no way to talk about sealing mouths. By afternoon, rumors were spreading wildly, saying the legendary Qingping Sword Lord had come to offer congratulations and taken the chance to spar with the young Shenming Dao Lord, only to end up slightly on the losing side.

“This is utter nonsense. Qin Wuyang, lose to a little girl of seventeen or eighteen?”

“Who started that rumor? They must be insane.”

“Isn’t Senior Qin supposed to be guarding the Northern Gate at the northern frontier? How could he possibly find time to go to the Zhen’nan Circuit?”

“Lies. It must be lies.”

The common folk didn’t know anything. The news circulated only in private among factions with a certain amount of influence. Even so, many still didn’t believe it, so the overall impact was not that big.

In the end, it was just too fantastical.

Many people not only didn’t want to believe it, they mostly didn’t dare to.

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But there was real impact all the same.

That night, when the plane carrying Bai Xiang and her group took off from the airport, many voices were plotting in the shadows that shrouded the Nine Provinces.

“Do we really have to detonate the Blood Abyss this early?”

“The demon race has given the order. We can only follow it.”

“This is a great undertaking that has been plotted for a thousand years. If it succeeds, not only will the whole of Great Yu be overturned, the entire world order will be rewritten.”

“I don’t understand why they won’t wait a bit longer.”

In a residence in Qiyun Circuit, many shadowy figures were deep in heated discussion.

This was clearly an illegal gathering, and everyone who had rushed here was a demon person.

“Wait for what? For Bai Zhixing to break another realm?” a voice sneered.

“Protector Zhao, you don’t actually believe that rumor, do you?” Another voice objected. “She’s only been cultivating for a bit more than half a year. You’re worried she’ll achieve the Sword Lord realm? That’s pure fantasy.”

“What about Chu Weiping then?” Protector Zhao asked. “It took Chu Weiping less than a year to rise.”

“That was Chu Weiping, not Bai Zhixing.”

“The Taishang Slaying-Emotions Life-Preserving Scripture.” Protector Zhao spoke the name. “What if Bai Zhixing switches to Qingping’s method?”

That—

It was as if the other man’s throat had been pinched shut. He fell silent at once.

“Everyone, we have to consider the worst possibilities.” Protector Zhao was frank. “It isn’t only the threat of her switching to the Taishang Slaying-Emotions Life-Preserving Scripture. There is also Chu Weiping.”

“Maybe his loss is just a rumor. Even if it’s true, it could be the two of them putting on a show.”

“But at this point, we’ve basically confirmed that after Bai Zhixing took over Shenming, she created a new, special method.”

“They’ve done an excellent job of keeping it a secret. Our people can’t infiltrate the inner sect and can’t find out what the new method is.”

“We can afford not to care about Bai Zhixing herself, but we must care about Chu Weiping. We must reckon with whether he can draw inspiration from Shenming’s new method.”

“Adding all those variables together, I personally support advancing the plan.”

The group fell briefly quiet, then began to argue again.

“I think we can.”

“Then let’s do it.”

“We can reach out to the Feathering Cult. The people there are crazy, but in the early stage our goals are similar.”

“Doesn’t the Feathering Cult have power overseas as well? Let them handle the Shenming Dao Lord.”

“We don’t need the Feathering Cult. She’s offended too many people. The imperial clans all hold shares in multinational corporations. If she goes abroad, she’s walking into death.”

“The Wetnu region should be under the control of several ‘giants’. The strongest among them have space-based weapons. No one overseas can protect her.”

“Once she dies, it will be easier to move here in Maozhou too.”

“Yes. The terrain here gives too much of an advantage. The only way to break it is from within. A frontal assault from outside would cost far too much.”

Watching the others change their stance, Protector Zhao showed a thin, cold smile.

In the darkness, no one noticed his features twist for a moment.

That writhing was something no human, not even a demon person, could produce.